Subsentio
by Dahlia
Summary: The prequel to 'A Thousand Miles'. In her 7th year, Hermione learns the cost of war, and the foundations are laid for her infatuation with a certain professor.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling and I am most certainly not making any profit from it.

* * *

_ Prologue_

In Covent Garden, on the corner of Southampton and Tavistock, there is a café. Despite its attractive façade and stylish, though innocuous, sign, it does not seem to attract many customers. Perhaps the reason for this lies in the very name of the café: Subsentio. An archaic, Latin word. A dead word, in most respects.

But that, of course, depends on your perspective.

Subsentio: to notice secretly. An interesting phrase, really. How does one notice secretly? The very act of noticing something generally removes any secret the previously over-looked object or fact may have protected. Perhaps it can be defined as seeing something others have not - finding that which is hidden, which no one else knows about. This is the most convenient description, and is how the word is most often interpreted.

There is, however, another explanation.

Subsentio: to see that which has always been there but never before truly noticed, and never before spoken of, till finally, in a moment of breathless clarity, it is thrust into focus. What was blurred becomes sharp, what was ambiguous becomes obvious.

A rather disconcerting experience, all things considered. To suddenly be totally aware of something that was only a dim, undefined hunch for days, weeks, even years, is startling and in many cases unpleasant.

Unpleasant, and painful, as revelations such as these may be at first, time does in fact heal most wounds. And sometimes, after they have been thoroughly examined and scrutinised, nasty shocks turn into pleasant surprises.

Imagine for a moment this picture: two people, a man and a woman, both silent and still, sit at a small, wrought iron table on a patio. It is enclosed by a high, brick wall, the pale stones of which seem to be trying to retain some shimmer of golden, late afternoon sunlight. It is dotted with tiny flowerbeds, fruit trees and climbing ivy. The sun is almost set, and there is an unlit candle on the table between them. The moment the last traces of the sunset fade from the sky, its wick catches and a small flame flickers to life - magically, of course.

There is a muted rumble of sound - one can never truly escape the sounds of London, even in a guarded and hidden place like this.

The woman is touching the back of the man's hand, and as they both sit, content to be near each other for a while, she wonders how this simple, intimate and seemingly unfeasible touch became possible.


	2. Chapter One

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling (with one little tidbit stolen from Terry Pratchett), and I am most certainly not making any profit from it.

* * *

_ Subsentio_

Hermione Granger sighed and shoved a hand through her hair. She rubbed her eyes and blinked a few times, trying to clear her vision. She was tired, and it was far too late, but she couldn't go to bed. Not yet.

She picked up her quill and stared down at the parchment. After a moment of thought, she began writing again, the scratch of the nib on rough paper the only noise in the deserted Gryffindor common room. The fire was low, and in the dim light her eyes felt as though they were on the verge of failing her entirely. But she was so _close_.

Arithmancy wasn't popular to begin with, and by the time the students of Hogwarts had reached their 7th year, only a handful of them chose to inflict the NEWT level Arithmancy course upon themselves. Hermione, unsurprisingly, was one of those select few. Perhaps 'inflict' was the wrong word - anyone who chose the course either had a very strong devotion to the subject or a deep and ultimately tragic need for failure.

Nevertheless, it was exceedingly difficult, and the image of Hermione, hunched over a pile of parchment in the early hours of the morning, was a testament to that. It wasn't as though this was a last minute rush to finish tomorrow's, or rather today's, assignment; that simply wasn't Hermione's style.

_But_ it was due in a week. And still not finished. This gave rise to some worry on her part.

The length of time it was taking her was certainly not due to lack of trying - she'd been calculating and re-calculating since Vector wrote the equation on the board on the first day of class. And, in all truthfulness, it hadn't been _assigned_. More used as an example of what they would be taught. And it's wasn't really _due_ either. Though Hermione knew in her heart of hearts that if she could solve it before the Halloween Feast, she'd prove herself as good as any pureblooded witch or wizard.

Of course, she never put it in as many words herself. But the subconscious has a lot to answer for in regards the true motivation behind any sane person's actions and choices in life. And even though she might choose to remain unaware of it, Hermione had always been desperate to prove herself - from the time she was first teased in primary school for being younger (her parents believed in Starting Early) and therefore more stupid than the other children, till she received her Hogwarts letter, and frantically devoured all her text books, terrified she'd be behind the other students.

Which was why she was sitting here, in the shadowy, silent Gryffindor common room with burning eyes and a throbbing head. But as long as pride and determination held common sense hostage, she wouldn't go to bed.

The silence was broken with a sudden snap. Hermione stared blankly at the parchment, at the bottom of which was an ugly blotch and the remains of the nib of her quill.

She sighed again, and, after a quick cleaning charm, straightened up in her chair, stretching out her painfully cramped muscles. It was time for a break - even aspiring geniuses needed to take a step back every so often.

Hermione climbed stiffly out of the chair and stretched again before picking up her cloak, smiling grimly at her popping joints. She wondered if Filch would still be prowling this late - probably not. Besides, 7th years were generally given a bit more leeway, and most of the professors knew of her habit of taking late night walks to the upper-level of the Astronomy Tower. She was competent and straight-laced enough to be trusted to neither get herself in trouble nor behave in an 'inappropriate' manner.

The last thought made her scowl as she climbed through the portrait hole. The Fat Lady was snoring in her frame, and didn't even stir as the portal clicked shut. Hermione wrapped her cloak around herself and walked as noiselessly as she could manage.

The walk was quicker than she had anticipated, and though the climb to the top of the tower left her panting slightly, when she had settled herself in a nook out of the wind and looked up, she knew it was all worth it.

The sky was a smooth and dark as black velvet, and hundreds of thousands of diamond-points of light shimmered through the atmosphere. Hermione smiled and began searching for constellations, noting the Great Bear, Orion, Cassiopeia, and the Serpent.

Her smile twisted a bit as she traced out the last one with her eyes, and she looked more sardonic than was normal.

"Slithering serpents," she murmured.

"An accurate, if rather mundane, description."

Hermione jumped up and looked around, straining to see in the darkness.

A slight rustle of cloth on cloth to her right, and then her eyes re-adjusted to the shadows. It was Snape, standing quite still, but far from the entrance to the tower, in front of one of the battlements. He must have been here before she arrived, and she had not seen him - the combination of her preoccupation and the darkness providing him with an effective cover.

She clamoured to her feet and contrived to look innocent.

Snape glided silently towards her, and she instinctively cringed back. Even though she was no longer a 4'5 first year, the man still managed to tower over her. His black robes and painfully thin frame probably helped exacerbate the illusion of extreme height, she noted bitterly.

Snape stopped inches away from Hermione, and she wondered if the phrase 'personal space' would have any meaning to him. He glared down at her.

"An early morning rendezvous, Miss Granger? Still waiting for your beau, I see."

Hermione resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

"No, sir, I'm not waiting for anyone. I just wanted to take a break from studying, and I often come up here when I want to be alone."

Snape raised an eyebrow. "It's 3am. If you are still studying, you have crossed the line from overzealous to obsessive. Go to bed."

Hermione bit her lip, waiting for the axe to fall. She wondered how many points he would take.

Snape sighed and rubbed his eyes. "No, Miss Granger, I'm not going to take any points. _This_ time. But if I catch you up here again, this late after curfew, rest assured I will take 50 points from Gryffindor, and inform McGonagall of the unhealthy hours you are keeping. Now get out of my sight before I decide to give you a detention."

The last sentenced contained more exasperation than malice, but Hermione scampered back down the tower as quickly as she could, not wanting to risk it.

It was only after she had climbed through the portrait hole and was gathering her things together in the common room that she wondered at Snape's behaviour. Though not nice by any stretch of the imagination, the usual venom and gleeful spite had been absent. Considering the circumstances, he could have take a hundred points and given her three weeks of detention, and she wouldn't have been surprised - in fact, she probably would have deserved it. But instead, he had just seemed tired and annoyed.

Not one to ignore such a mystery, Hermione filed it away for further inspection tomorrow. Yawning loudly, she climbed the stairs to her dormitory.

* * *

The next day came quickly, and Hermione woke to her cheerfully chirping alarm clock. She resisted the urge to hex it into oblivion, and instead satisfied herself with hitting the snooze button as hard as she could manage.

The charmed beeping cut off immediately, and Hermione enjoyed 15 more minutes of blissful silence. Well, in theory she should have enjoyed 15 minutes of said bliss. Unfortunately, Lavender's alarm went off 3 minutes after hers. And it was far less easy to subdue.

Hermione muttered to herself as her roommate alternately pleaded for and demanded a few more minutes from the tiny, talking cuckoo that had emerged from the clock's case. However, the problem with pseudo-sentient, magical alarm clocks is that they don't take no for an answer. Despite the fact that begging, threatening or full-out screaming at her alarm clock had never worked once in the past 6 years, Lavender still felt the need to try every morning.

Hermione had, on far more than one occasion, debated whether to curse the blasted clock into inaction, or simply bash it into very small pieces with one of her heftier textbooks.

In all her early morning fantasies, the latter option always seemed far more satisfying.

As that particular daydream played through her head (lingering at the rewarding little 'poing' as that damned talking cuckoo was dislodged, spring and all, and went hurtling out the window at high speeds), Hermione dragged herself into the bathroom, stripped quickly before the other girls were out of bed, and stepped into a shower stall.

She turned the water onto full blast, and shrieked as a spray of cold water slammed into her like a 10 ton lorry.

The water heated up after a moment, but not before irreversible damage had been done to her nerves.

A quick wash, and Hermione stood in front of a steamed-up mirror, her hair still desperately fighting to retain its unruly curls. She murmured a quick drying charm, grimaced as her hair sprung into frizzy curls, and padded back into the bedroom. Lavender had finally pulled herself out of bed, and in doing so turned off her alarm. The little cuckoo had retreated back inside the clock, but Hermione shot it a malevolent glare nevertheless.

Parvati had also been woken up by Lavender's alarm - it was inevitable, really. They both staggered off to the bathroom, and Hermione dressed quickly and comfortably, as usual; jeans, snug t-shirt with jumper over top, trainers and school robes. She never understood girls (i.e. Parvati and Lavender) who made such a huge deal out of dressing in the morning.

You were wearing robes. No one would see you anyway.

Hermione had tried this argument once, in 3rd year. Apparently, logic is about as far removed from the life of the average teenage girl as the finer points of deep core drilling.

Needless to say, her opinions were not looked upon favourably, or with much regard at all. Eventually, Hermione came to the conclusion that if they were happy, there was no need to upset or confuse her roommates. Since then, she had never brought up their blatant and utter lack of common sense.

Or used words with more than two syllables in conversations with them.

Lavender and Parvati had finally finished their morning wash, and had returned to the dorm room, only to flit back and forth from each others trunks in their knickers, deciding what to wear, and giggling far more than was healthy at this hour of the morning.

Hermione sighed to herself, and, after swinging her satchel over her shoulder, headed down into the Gryffindor common room.

_It's going to be a long, painful day,_ she thought.

* * *

Oddly enough, Hermione's prediction came true, but this didn't please her in the slightest, considering her feelings towards Trelawney, and Divination in general.

Because there were so few students still taking NEWT-level Arithmancy this year, all four houses were put into one class. Even then, there were only 9 people - mostly Ravenclaws really, except for 2 Slytherins and Hermione.

It was one of those Ravenclaws, Stibbons, who had upgraded her mood from 'mild irritation' to 'murderous rage'.

Innocently enough (or so she'd thought at first), he had sat down beside her before the lesson and asked her if she had ever given any thought to that equation Vector had written on the board for them in the first class. Hermione, lying through her teeth, said yes, but it was a while ago.

Apparently, this was some sort of invitation.

The little bugger had whipped out a sheaf of parchment, and had begun trying to explain to her what he had tried. Was she supposed to care? Critique his technique? Correct his (seemingly non-existent) mistakes?

As page after page of what appeared to be correct and no doubt brilliant equations were thrust under her nose, her mood grew fouler and fouler.

After only 7 minutes, her day was completely ruined.

If Vector had been even a minute late, Stibbons would have been in the Hospital Wing.

For a week.

But the professor arrived exactly on time, as she always did, and class began.

It was a singularly horrible experience; the first class (other than Divination, of course) that Hermione found she did not enjoy. All she could think was that Stibbons, pretentious, inbred, socially retarded, severely-in-need-of-dental-work-and-acne-cream Stibbons had managed to solve the equation, while she hadn't.

After what seemed like days of endless torture, class ended. Hermione made a mad dash for the door and succeeded in eluding Stibbons, who would surely have tried to accost her again with his perfect Arithmancy.

Hermione hid out in the library over lunch, feeling too anxious and angry to even consider eating. She buried herself in one of the shadowy recesses, somewhere beyond the historical periodicals, where she knew no one would ever venture.

Time passes quickly though, when you're busy over-analysing all your mistakes and methodically cataloguing all your personal defects. It was time for NEWT-level Potions.

Hermione straightened her back, thrust her chin forward and marched out of the library and down into the dungeon. She was ready for anything Snape could throw at her today - in the mood she was in, she could take on a rampaging manticore and come out the victor.

No, the real question was whether Snape would survive her, should he choose her as the victim of any of his more charming personality traits.


	3. Chapter Two

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling, and I am most certainly not making any profit from it.

* * *

Hermione was the first student to arrive. She dropped her satchel on the flagstone floor before sitting down in front of a worktable. NEWT-level Potions had not attracted many students - more than the NEWT Arithmancy class (surprisingly) but many had preferred to stay in regular Potions.

The only notable exceptions had been the Slytherins - they easily comprised most of the class. Other than that, there was a small group of Ravenclaws, a lone Hufflepuff, and again, Hermione. Not many Gryffindors would willingly choose to subject themselves to an advanced class in which Snape gave them his personal and exacting attention.

But, as always, Hermione's unconscious clamouring for praise and academic recognition had taken control, and though she did truly enjoy Potions, there was more to her choice than an honest enjoyment of the subject. Snape was one of the few professors at Hogwarts who had never given her the praise she felt she deserved. Even a simple, approving nod of the head would have sufficed. But the only real acknowledgement she had ever received, other than being referred to as 'Potter's little friend', or being told to put her hand down in class, had been that horrible, horrible incident with her teeth in her 4th year. That sort of acknowledgement was certainly not what she had wanted.

Hermione took a deep breath and closed her eyes, trying to relax. She could feel the knots in her shoulders and back, and stretched, arching her spine and twisting her arms about, trying to release some of the tension. She sighed, and let her head fall over. Exhaustion was catching up with her - she had been getting around four hours of sleep a night all week, and it was catching up.

_Thank god for the weekend,_ she thought, closing her eyes.

She felt rather than heard Snape come up behind her, and the fine hairs on her arms and the back of her neck rose. She knew it was Snape; who else could be so completely silent?

Hermione opened her eyes and stared forward. If he wanted to snap at her, she wasn't going to help him by playing the scared little girl.

"Miss Granger," he said softly, his voice lacking its normal malice.

Hermione turned her head to the side, and she could see him faintly out of the corner of her eye.

"Sir?"

"You're early."

"Yes, I was in the library, and thought I'd come down before everyone rushed out of the Great Hall and crowded the corridors."

She thought she saw Snape nod, and turned her head back.

She still felt as though she was being watched though, and, uncomfortably aware of her slouching posture, she sat up straight, and threaded her fingers together on the table in front of her.

Snape snorted.

"Don't feel you have to put up the 'apt pupil' façade for me, Miss Granger."

Hermione stiffened, and thought _Ahhh. There's the Snape we know and love._

She sat up straighter and stared blankly ahead, a tactic normally reserved for nagging parents.

"How very…petulant."

Snape's voice slithered over her shoulder and caressed her earlobe. She fought back a shiver, and wondered again why he insisted on using The Voice. It worked perfectly for instilling mind-numbing fear in 1st through 4th year students, but after the girls (and some of the boys, to be fair) began hitting puberty…well, it still induced terror, but it had the added quality of sending the plethora of hormones normally present in any given teenaged body into an orgy of delight.

Or so Hermione hoped. She had never worked up the courage to ask Lavender and Parvati what they thought of The Voice. But they didn't seem the types who liked dark-mysterious-and-angsty - they were more pretty-muscular-and-mind-numbingly-stupid kind of girls.

Hermione sighed, in both sexual and intellectual frustration, and half-turned in her chair again.

"If you're trying to make me cry, would you mind speeding it up a bit?"

Snape had the decency to look abashed, before he scowled.

"That remark has just cost Gryffindor 30 points, Miss Granger. I hope you're pleased."

She just turned in her chair again and waved a hand tiredly.

In actuality, she wasn't all that pleased. Rather alarmed, really, that she had just said something so blunt and rude to a professor.

_But,_ she rationalised, _it's Professor Snape. Regardless of his work for the Order, his personal opinion stopped counting in 4th year._

This, of course, brought the unfortunate Teeth Incident to the forefront of her mind. Hermione's already bad mood quickly took a further downward spiral. She scowled.

Snape had since moved to his desk, and was completely ignoring her.

The rest of the students began filing into the classroom. Her lab partner, Blaise Zabini, slid into the seat beside hers, and watched her warily.

"What?" she snapped, not looking up at him.

He jumped, and grinned slightly.

"Wake up to find a house elf stoking your fire, Granger?"

"No Zabini, I thought they were all being tortured in the Slytherin Bondage Room?"

He chuckled, and pulled out his quill and a sheet of parchment. "Touché. But wrong, unfortunately. It's only on Thursdays and Saturdays that we miserable Slytherin bastards engage in any elf-torture."

Hermione continued scowling at the table, willing it to spontaneously combust and kill her in the process.

Blaise snapped his fingers in front of her face a few times.

"Oi, snap out of it, Granger, we have work to do here." He leaned closer, and lowered his voice. "And if you don't, I'll pour slug juice down your robe."

Hermione looked at him with contempt. "I thought we had progressed beyond that point in 5th year, Zabini."

Blaise winked, and murmured, "Of course we have, but I can't be acting as though I were concerned about you - imagine how tarnished my reputation would become. And since I'm not willing to sacrifice my image without sufficient compensation, it'll have to be the slug juice."

Hermione blinked, and stared at him, feigning naiveté. "Sufficient compensation…?"

Blaise raised an eyebrow, grinned and shook his head. "Merlin's balls, Granger, you Gryffs really are thick. Though," his grin widened, and he leaned closer again, "I do rather like the whole innocence thing."

* * *

A rather odd exchange for a Gryffindor and Slytherin, but as with all things, there is a story behind it.

In their tumultuous 5th year, Snape decided he had finally had enough of Hermione coaching Neville in Potions class. In the middle of the autumn term, he had (much to her unspoken relief) declared that she was to never partner with Neville again. With a few pangs of guilt at her barely masked pleasure, Hermione wondered what other partnership would have to be broken up. It was then that she noticed the malicious grin on Snape's face.

Five minutes later, she was sitting next to a surprisingly calm Blaise Zabini, and Neville had been partnered with the hulking horror that was Millicent Bulstrode.

With a shiver, Hermione looked away from her cringing ex-partner, and eyed Blaise. He had also been watching Millicent and Neville, but his expression was far removed from Hermione's - amusement instead of dismay.

She immediately bristled - how dare he laugh at poor Neville's misfortune?

_Or Bulstrode's,_ her inner voice added.

Hermione sighed and looked back at Blaise, who was now grinning at her.

"Seems as though we've both lucked out," he said quietly. "I've finally gotten away from that troglodyte, and you will be spared the humiliation of being the focus of Longbottom's woeful, longing stares for the fifth year running."

Hermione gaped at Blaise.

"I was never the focus of anything of Neville's," she hissed.

Blaise raised an eyebrow.

And so it began. Once Hermione realised that Blaise was just testing her and seeing how well he could push her buttons, she stopped responding. Though she might be a Gryffindor, she was anything but thick, and she was well aware that Slytherins were all about power-games.

So, after a few days of careful deliberation, she started to play.

Blaise was pleased, and obviously so. They had been brewing a rather complex concealing concoction, and Blaise had remarked that perhaps, if he poured the slug juice he was currently adding to the cauldron over Hermione's robes, it might "mask that wretched Gryffindor scent."

Hermione, without blinking an eye, pointed out that by the same token she could quite easily douse him with the essence of Bicorn liver she was measuring out, which would turn him a charming shade of purple, as well as kill him.

Blaise had just laughed.

* * *

It would be a lie to say that Hermione hadn't worried about what would happen when she and Blaise both began NEWT-level Potions in their 7th year. She knew that they could never _choose_ to work together - it would be unacceptable within the sharply defined Slytherin-Gryffindor interaction scheme, particularly with Voldemort on the rise - the animosity and competition between the two houses had gradually been swelling into a vicious, full-fledged hatred.

So she had a hard time masking her relief when Snape paired them up. He had sneered, as usual, but she caught a glimpse of something else when he glanced at Blaise. Blaise, being the Slytherin he was, pretended he had no idea what she was talking about.

Hermione, understanding (unlike most of her housemates) that discretion was the better part of valour, gave up, after only a quarter of an hour - a new record for her.

Their classes had progressed much as usual up till this point, and Hermione, irritated as she was, knew it was futile to hold on to her foul mood as long as Blaise was trying to make her laugh.

They didn't have much chance to talk before they had to focus their attention completely on the project at hand. Snape, though a strong factor, was not the sole reason few students took the NEWT Potions class - it was a difficult course, and not all students who applied for it were accepted.

It wasn't till the end of class, while they were cleaning up, that Blaise slipped a scrap of parchment into Hermione's hand. He threw her a wink, and walked out of the class before her, with the rest of the Slytherins.

Hermione didn't read it till she reached her dormitory - her last period on Friday was a spare, and both Lavender and Parvati were blessedly absent.

The note read: _You, Me, and a study date in the Astronomy Tower after dinner. No excuses Granger! You're starting to slip in Potions, and I can't have you dragging me down with you._

Hermione snorted. Slipping, indeed. He probably just wanted to go over the homework for next week. She crumpled the note up, and incinerated it with a murmured spell and swish of her wand.

* * *

Hermione sat across from Harry and Ron at the Gryffindor table that evening, preoccupied with pushing her zucchini wedges around her plate. The boys, as usual, were prattling on about Quidditch, but even if they hadn't been, Hermione still doubted she would have been paying much attention.

She was thinking about Blaise. He didn't seem to be at dinner tonight, which only gave more fuel to that train of thought. She couldn't make heads or tales of the boy most of the time - she had just learned to feign confidence in front of him, and apparently that was the way to win a Slytherin's…a Slytherin's what? Respect, attention, affection?

She frowned at her plate, and started turning an unfortunate pile of peas into green mush with the flat of her fork.

_It's just a study date, Hermione. Get a hold of yourself,_ she thought.

But no matter how many times she repeated that mantra, there remained a niggling little worry at the back of her mind. He had called it a date. No matter if it was in jest - in all the time they'd been meeting up, generally in some abandoned classroom, to study, he had _never_ called it a date.

And why the Astronomy Tower, of all places? It was The Place where students went to engage in extracurricular activities. Very extracurricular activities. On Friday and Saturday nights, there was a queue.

Hermione frowned and dropped her fork onto her plate with a clatter. Harry and Ron looked up in surprise at the sharp noise.

"All right there, Hermione?" Ron asked, looking mildly concerned. Apparently, they had actually noticed how quiet she was.

She smiled slightly, and nodded. "Yeah, I'm just a bit preoccupied with some Arithmancy."

The A-word made Ron shudder - he had learned by now that it was far better to simply leave well enough alone where Hermione and scholarly musings, particularly Arithmancy-related ones, were concerned.

"Don't worry, I'm sure you'll do brilliantly at whatever it is," Harry said.

She smiled again, and pushed back from the table.

"I'm going to go to the library, I'll see you back in the common room later?"

The boys nodded, smiled, and quickly returned to their conversation.

Hermione hefted her ever-present satchel, and walked out of the Great Hall. They were sweet boys, they really were. But sometimes she really wondered if they saw her as anything other than a walking encyclopedia that tended to nag around exam time. She sighed, and headed up the stairs to the Astronomy Tower.


	4. Chapter Three

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling, and I am most certainly not making any profit from it.

* * *

The Astronomy Tower was, in the simplest terms, exactly what its name implied. During the course of the week, it hosted classes each night which, depending on the time of year, could begin as early as 8pm or as late as midnight. 

Classes took place on the higher level of the tower, the level Hermione had gotten into the habit of frequenting in the very early morning. It was open to the air, and being the tallest point of the castle, had an uninterrupted panorama of both the sky and the countryside around Hogwarts. Some Muggle-born Astronomy students liked to joke that they could see the lights of Dundee on clear nights. This always managed to confuse Sinistra (whose memory was so filled with star charts and orbital paths that she had enough trouble remembering her student's names), who asked what sector Dundee was in, and whether it was a Muggle name for an otherwise familiar satellite.

There was another level to the Tower, though, below the battlements, which was infinitely more comfortable and less draughty.

This lower level of the Tower was deserted when she arrived, and the sun had almost set. Long slices of pale-gold sunlight, pouring in from the western windows, cut across the stone floor.

As she sat down on one of the long couches, Hermione wondered again why there was actual furniture up here. Particularly long, comfortable furniture. The staff couldn't _really_ be that thick, or accepting, of what the aforementioned furnishings were generally used for.

That thought brought a number of unpleasant mental images to mind, and Hermione stood up again quickly to check for stains. Satisfied she was in no danger of sitting in someone else's secretions, she sat down again, and pulled her Potions text out.

She was re-reading the chapter they had been covering for the past few classes when Blaise appeared at the door of the stairway. She looked up and smiled faintly, unable to push aside a sense of unease. Her worry only increased when for probably the first time since she had known him, Blaise looked sombre. He cast a quick ward over the door, and a silencing charm.

"Hi," he said quietly, and walked over to her. Hermione watched him carefully, her nervousness plainly written across her face. He sat down next to her and chuckled.

"You look like you're waiting for me to pounce, Granger," a tinge of bitterness colouring the otherwise light tone of his voice. "Not all Slytherins are evil, Muggle-hating Death Eaters-in-training you know."

"Yes, I know…"

"Really?" he said, forcing a smile as he cut her off. "You must be the only one."

Blaise stood up and started wandering around the room restlessly. Hermione watched him.

"Zabini, stop. What's happened?"

He stopped in front of her and looked down. He started laughing, a nervous, strained sound that was both false and frightening.

"Oh Merlin, if a Gryff can tell something's bothering me, then I might as well jump out a particularly high window right now."

Hermione stood up, her forgotten Potions text tumbling to the floor.

"Blaise, stop it!"

Her use of his given name surprised him into silence, and he stared at her. She could see the fear in his eyes, and wondered frantically what to do. He didn't give her a chance to speak - he was against her suddenly, his arms wrapped around her shoulders, clinging to her.

"They refuse to take no for an answer," he whispered.

She wrapped her arms around his waist, and held him.

* * *

Other than a few candles Hermione had lit with a wave of her wand, the Astronomy Tower was dark. She was sitting on a couch, and Blaise was curled up beside her, his dark head in her lap.

"We should go," she said quietly, "other people will be trying to get in here soon. There may even be a class."

He didn't respond, just sighed quietly.

"Let's go find a classroom, Blaise. Where we won't be bothered."

He pushed himself slowly up into a sitting position, not looking at her.

"You know that if I tell you what's going on, it will only put you in a bloody great lot of danger. And don't give me any toss about your little adventures in the Golden Trio. You really have no idea how lucky the three of you have been. You particularly - you're a Muggle-born."

Hermione stiffened. "I'll have you know Zabini, I am -"

"Spare me the self-righteous tirade," he said, cutting her off sharply. "_I_ know you're thrice as good as most purebloods. But that doesn't matter to some people, which you must have learned by now. It would be bad enough if you were just one of Potter's friends, but the fact that you're Muggle-born makes it ten times worse." She was silent, watching him watch the floor. "I don't agree with the propaganda. I personally think it's a load of bollocks, and I have no desire to turn into a pathetic, sycophantic little arse-licker like Malfoy. Slytherins are _ambitious_! We bloody well do things on our own, and the only way we agree to work with or," here he shuddered, "_for_ someone else is if it's the best offer on the table. And I'm waiting for the best offer."

Hermione watched the candlelight pick out the highlights in Blaise's hair, and listened as he easily told her exactly what he thought, but in such a way that it could be seen to support either side.

"Above all else, I don't want to be owned, or claimed. Not by anyone." He looked up at her angrily. "By _anyone_, Hermione. I will make my own choices for as long as I safely can, and though I most certainly do not share certain views, I am by no means a noble, happy, shining Gryffindor. Nor will I ever be." His voice lowered, and he looked away. "And if I have to choose between my life and my beliefs…I'm not brave, and I will choose to live, however I can."

They were both silent, and finally, Blaise looked up. Hermione was clearly angry. Her eyes were fierce, and her hands were clenched into fists. "Why," she asked, "have you already given yourself up for lost?"

He smiled bitterly. "You honestly think I can get out of this alive and un-Marked?"

"Have you even _thought_ of asking for help?" she cried, jumping to her feet. Blaise looked startled.

"Well, I am talking to you -"

"Don't be so dim, Zabini! What on earth can I do? I'm only a student. Why haven't you asked Dumbledore?"

Blaise's face darkened. "I'm not a Gryffindor, Granger. And since your entire House lives in an ivory tower, and hasn't noticed the blatant favouritism that goes on, let me tell you about it. Do you remember the Leaving Feast in our first year? How us wicked Slytherins were first told we had won the House Cup, only to have it snatched from under our noses in the most hurtful, humiliatingly cruel way possible? We were children too, you know. Some of the first and second years cried on the train home. And Slytherins learn very quickly not to go to any Professors, with the exception of Snape, with a complaint about another House because ninety-nine percent of the time we will be blamed, regardless of what has actually happened. So no, Hermione. I am not going to go to Dumbledore, because although he may well treat you and your Gryffindor friends like his own bloody grandchildren, I somehow doubt I'd be looked upon as favourably."

Hermione sat down, chastened and pale. She had never even thought of what happened at the end of their 1st year as anything but justified and fair.

Blaise was stiff beside her.

"You're right," she said in a small voice. He said nothing. "Maybe…maybe you could talk to Snape?"

Blaise snorted and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Bad idea. He's very supportive of his Slytherins, but there are rumours about his…loyalties, most of which are very well founded…"

Hermione looked up at him, and was shocked at the bleakness written plainly across his face.

"No, Snape isn't…Blaise, trust me. He's on our side."

"How can you be so sure?" he asked quietly, still staring ahead.

"I just am. You'll have to believe me."

He shook his head. "I don't know…that'd be a really big chance to take…"

"Do you have any other choice?"

Blaise looked at his hands, clasped loosely between his knees. "No, I suppose I don't. But not yet. It mightn't get any worse." Hermione looked skeptical, and he smiled faintly. "If things do take a bad turn, I'll go to him."

"Promise?"

Blaise smiled.

* * *

Halloween came, and Hermione actually managed to forget about her supposed Arithmancy problems. Mostly because she was concerned about Blaise of course, but it helped that a few days before, when she was packing up her satchel after Arithmancy, she over-heard Stibbons showing Vector the work he had done on the infamous equation. To her amazement, Vector had laughed, and told him his work was all wrong, because that particular problem was unsolvable.

Hermione had almost dropped her inkbottle. She had stuffed her remaining books into her bag without looking up and scurried out of the classroom, only to burst into giddy, relieved laughter once she was safely in the corridor.

Even without her worries about Arithmancy, Hermione remained just as tightly wound. She simply focused more of her energies on worrying about Blaise. It bothered her that there was no easy solution. She couldn't go to Dumbledore - it was quite clear that Blaise wanted nothing to do with the Headmaster. That also meant the rest of the Order was out of the question. She knew she couldn't reveal its existence to Blaise, particularly since he had made it quite clear he was more concerned about his own well-being than choosing sides. So what other options were there? The answer wouldn't be in a book somewhere in the library, so research was disconcertingly pointless. She couldn't ask Harry or Ron, because brave as they were, they'd only be suspicious of Blaise and over-protective of her. They were already starting to worry at her caginess, and the bags under her eyes weren't helping to dissuade them.

Hermione sighed and dropped her quill. She was supposed to be finishing a report for Potions, but she just couldn't concentrate on anything other than Blaise.

Ron, sitting in an armchair opposite her, in front of the common room fire, looked up. "What's wrong?"

Hermione shook her head and smiled. "Nothing, really. Just exhausted, and my hand is starting to cramp up."

"Nothing out of the ordinary there, then," Ron said mildly. She opened her mouth to protest, but he grinned. "I'm just taking the piss, Hermione. Really, you've got to stop putting so much sugar in your tea, it's making you jumpy."

She grinned back. "You're probably right. I think I'm just going to go to bed, though."

"Right. Sleep well."

"Thanks," she said, gathering up her papers before heading up to her dorm. "Night Ron, Harry."

Harry looked up from an armchair a few feet away and smiled at her as she walked past and up the stairs. Ron watched after her, a faint frown on his face.

"Do you think she's actually going to sleep?" he asked in a quiet voice.

"I hope so," Harry murmured. "She looks so tired all the time."

Ron nodded silently, and looked back at the book he was reading, only to read the same page, over and over, till he finally went to bed.


	5. Chapter Four

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling (except Blaise's sex. I get all that. Hah!) and I am most certainly not making any profit from it. Also, I stole a little from William Golding. I hope he doesn't mind.

* * *

Hermione was sitting in the library, poring over an enormous Charms book, when someone sat down beside her.

She looked up, more than a little annoyed, but the snide remark she was preparing to make died in her throat when she saw that it was Malfoy.

"What do you want?" she hissed.

He smirked and raised an eyebrow. "Now, now Granger, is it really that hard to be civil? I know you've been left lacking in regards etiquette because of your upbringing, but you must have learned something over the past seven years." He paused, then sat back, his smirk widening. "Oh, I forgot the company you keep. Never mind then."

Hermione ground her teeth together, and stood up. Malfoy snickered, but as she turned to walk away his hand shot out and clamped down around her wrist. He pulled her down, closer to him.

"You might want to show a bit more discretion in regards who you choose to associate with. It can have repercussions, you know," he murmured. Hermione froze in fear and anger. "But since you seem so willing to be Zabini's whore…" Malfoy leaned forward and pressed his face into her hair. She could feel his hot breath on her scalp. "Perhaps you might have some use after all, Mudblood."

"What exactly are you doing to Miss Granger, Mister Malfoy?"

Her wrist was freed instantly, and Hermione fell back, directly into Snape. He caught her shoulders automatically and looked down at her, his eyes suspiciously blank. Malfoy, who had stretched his legs out in front of him, was suddenly the picture of serenity.

"Discussing some Potions work, Professor."

Snape narrowed his eyes. "I see. Perhaps you should return to the common room now, as it's nearing curfew."

Malfoy smiled winningly, stood up and sauntered away.

Hermione knew she was trembling, and wondered if Snape could tell. She picked up her satchel from the floor beside the table, and started to walk away.

"Miss Granger."

She stopped, half turning her face towards the man behind her. "Sir?"

"Are you…Did -"

"I'm fine," she said, before retreating.

* * *

She didn't want to believe it.

_But since you seem so willing to be Zabini's whore…_

Malfoy's words echoed in her head. He couldn't have just reached that conclusion by himself. It simply wasn't possible that an inbred ferret could make leaps of logic that great. No, the nasty little wanker must have heard from somewhere that Blaise and she…

Hermione rolled over and stared at the inside of her bed's curtains. They were drawn tonight, even though it hadn't gotten really cold yet. She just didn't want to have to face anyone else, even the familiar annoyances that were her roommates.

How _could_ he? He wouldn't. Would he?

Hermione pulled a pillow tight against her chest, and wrapped herself around it. She closed her eyes and consciously pushed all those horrible thoughts out of her mind, allowing herself a moment's peace. It almost worked, too.

_Perhaps you might have some use after all, Mudblood._

Hermione sat up and kicked the sheets off. Crookshanks, who had decided to stay the night in the dormitory with her for once, blinked lazily at her from the foot of the bed, and started to purr. She crawled over to him and scratched his head, sending him into an orgy of joy.

"Thank you for staying in tonight," she whispered. The big cat just blinked at her knowingly. After a moment's hesitation, she pushed aside a hanging and climbed out of bed. She padded to her trunk and pulled on the jeans which had been discarded atop it yesterday. She threw a jumper on over her tank top and pulled her trainers on.

Casting a silencing charm about herself before slipping her wand up her sleeve, Hermione crept out of her dorm room.

The fire in the common room was embers now, and a glance at the grandfather clock in the corner showed that there was an hour or so till sunrise. It was unlikely even Filch would still be up. Snape, however, was another story entirely.

"Hope springs eternal," she mumbled to herself as she climbed out the portrait hole.

* * *

Hermione sat back against the stone on the western side of the Astronomy Tower and looked up at the dark sky. No stars tonight - just clouds. Maybe they'd break at dawn. It would be nice to see the sun rise, but she wasn't holding her breath. It was quite cold, and she felt restless and wound up despite her lack of sleep, so she pulled herself up and started to walk the circumference of the tower, running her fingers over the rough stone as she went.

She lost count of how many circuits she made after the first few dozen, and instead concentrated on not thinking about Malfoy, or Blaise, or anything else remotely Slytherin-related. Just as she thought her legs were going to give out, she noticed that the sky was slightly lighter than it had been on her last pass.

She stopped, and crossed her arms on top of an eastern-facing battlement. It was like watching the hour hand of a clock - there was no obvious difference from moment to moment, but after a while the change was noticeable.

Slowly, the sky became a lighter grey, and Hermione decided that it was going to be a wretched day.

She looked down at the misty grounds of Hogwarts, once she could see clearly, and noticed a dark figure walking slowly up from the main entrance, around the lake. It couldn't be more than 6am - who would be up this early, let alone coming from Hogsmeade?

She decided, pushing her curiosity aside, that if someone else was up this early and on their way to the school then it was time she returned to Gryffindor Tower. Hermione wasn't certain when curfew ended, really, but she didn't want to lose house points on a technicality.

She shivered, and headed inside.

* * *

The day dragged out, time sluggishly creeping past Hermione as she waited for Potions. She hadn't seen Blaise since the class last week, and while normally this wouldn't have bothered her, she was angry and confused as to why he had avoided her all weekend, purposely not meeting her eye when she stared at him across the Great Hall, or hurrying off in the opposite direction if he saw her in the corridors.

While they might not be able to speak in great detail in class, she could make it clear she wanted to meet him that evening, and if he didn't agree she'd jinx him into next week.

Another lunch came, and Hermione fell into a seat at the Gryffindor table.

"How was Arithmancy?" Ron said, grinning as he grabbed a few sandwiches from the platter in front of him. Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Not as captivating as Divination, I'm sure."

Harry laughed. "Trelawney gets loonier every year. Today she declared that this year I'm going to die for certain, but before that, I would lose faith in my soul mate." He shook his head. "I don't even fancy anyone, let alone have a soul mate."

Ron smirked around a mouth full of tuna and mayonnaise. "Maybe you just haven't noticed her yet."

Hermione rolled her eyes again, and concentrated on her plate, ignoring the wild speculations and horribly inaccurate predictions the boys made. Divination was still a spectacular waste of time in her estimation, even with Firenze teaching some of the classes, but she felt so worn thin with stress that it was no longer worth the energy to belittle it.

She ate quickly, re-reading a chapter of her Potions text as she did. She didn't notice the lull in the conversation, nor the worried looks from Harry and Ron.

"Uh, Hermione?"

"Yes?" she asked without looking up from her textbook.

Harry pulled the book out of her line of vision, and she looked up. Both boys were looking at her with wide, worried eyes.

"What's been going on lately?" Harry asked quietly.

"Nothing." She felt uncomfortable under their disbelieving gaze. "Honestly, I've just been working too hard. Nothing unusual there. It's just that it's our last year and what with NEWTs and all I'm just pushing myself a bit harder. But I'm fine, really."

She gave them what she hoped was a reassuring smile, and pulled her textbook back from under Harry's hands. "It's almost time for class. I don't want to be late for Potions." She tucked her book into her satchel and fled the Great Hall.

Ron looked after her.

"D'you think she was telling the truth?" Harry murmured.

Ron sighed and shook his head. "Dunno."

* * *

Hermione slid into her seat and waited as the rest of the students trickled into the Potions classroom. Blaise trailed in last, behind the rest of the Slytherins. He sat down beside her silently and looked down at the table.

He looked ill - there were dark circles under his eyes, and he was very pale. He also completely ignored Hermione's scrutiny.

Snape swept in, and the class quieted, paying close attention - they were studying some of the most deadly poisons today, along with their antidotes. Hermione busied herself with taking notes as the professor lectured, outlining the basic principles of the antidotes and poisons, and the ways in which they interacted.

An hour and a half later Hermione's fingers ached, but she was eager to begin the practical. Half the class would brew the Ioncanus. Derived mostly from iocane powder, it was not only deadly but also fast-acting, and untraceable when in potion form. While this made using it far more preferable, the potion itself was ridiculously difficult to make. It was also long thought impossible to counteract, but a few decades ago an antidote had been discovered; this was what the other half of the class would be making.

Hermione and Blaise silently started on their antidote - she grinding up pumpkin and mustard seeds and he stirring the Augury eggs. The Hippocampus scales were already simmering in the cauldron over a low flame. Snape walked through the class, keeping a close eye on the students brewing the antidote, because of their use of cockatrice ichors.

In its distilled form, it was extremely toxic and had a tendency to burn its way through anything other than lead. But when added to the antidote and combined with a powdered bezoar, it lost some of its potency, though would still cause severe vomiting. Ironically enough, as Snape had explained, this was quite necessary, and one of the reasons the antidote was so difficult. The ingredients had to be balanced properly so that while the helpful, cleansing qualities of such things as the Hippocampus scales and the Augury eggs had time to be absorbed and take effect, the purging effects of the cockatrice ichors couldn't be suppressed so long that they would no longer be helpful in removing the toxin from the body.

Both Hermione and Blaise were absorbed in their antidote, and all the tension between them quickly faded, more out of necessity than anything else. Two years had taught them to work well together, and anticipate the other's moves. But Blaise wasn't really himself, and while he was stirring, Hermione moved to add the ground seeds. He didn't move immediately, so she touched his shoulder.

That he jumped slightly wasn't all that unexpected - it was the wince that surprised her. She stared at him for a moment, then dumped the powder into the cauldron. Blaise kept stirring, not looking up, so she leaned her head close to his.

"You and I need to talk. Will you please meet me tonight after dinner in the library?" she whispered.

Blaise didn't respond.

"Please, Blaise?"

He stiffened, then nodded slightly, still not looking at her. Hermione decided that was the best she was going to get, and turned her concentration back to the potion. But for the rest of the class she was very careful not to touch him.


	6. Chapter Five

**Disclaimer:** Despite my best efforts, I still haven't overthrown Jo Rowling and claimed her universe for my own. Soon, my pretties, soon….So, basically, everything belongs to her, and I'm making no profit from it. Yet.

* * *

She was waiting when he walked into the library. Blaise sat down at a table near hers, and opened a book. Trying to look aloof, Hermione gathered her things together, and headed towards the door. As she passed him, she let a scrap of parchment fall from her hand to the floor.

She didn't look back, just walked out of the library, towards the place written on the note: 4th floor hallway, sixth door on the right.

She arrived, fifteen minutes later, and slipped into the dusty room, closing the door behind her. She wondered, not for the first time, why Hogwarts had so many unused classrooms, and resolved to scour 'Hogwarts: A History' later, to see if she could find any statistics on changes in the Wizarding population over the years. Right now, however, there were more important issues occupying her thoughts.

Hermione wandered around a jumble of chairs and desks and sat on the ledge of one of the tall, gothic windows, which looked out onto the grounds. She could see the Quidditch pitch and the greenhouses. The former was occupied by Ravenclaws, getting in a last minute practice for the game against Slytherin tomorrow afternoon.

She heard the door open and click shut, but didn't turn around. Slow footsteps echoed off the high ceilings, making it hard to tell where, exactly, they were coming from, or going to.

Blaise stopped behind her, and looked over her shoulder.

"They need all the practice they can get," he said quietly, watching Ravenclaws swoop and swirl above the pitch.

Hermione, never one to avoid a point of contention with small talk, turned and looked up at his face. "Why does Malfoy think you are I are sleeping together?"

Blaise stiffened, and slowly pulled away from her.

"Well?"

"I assume he reached his own conclusions based upon evidence available."

"Evidence available," Hermione repeated, her eyes narrowing. "And that means what, exactly?"

Blaise rubbed his eyes and pushed his dark hair back, off his forehead. "It means Tracey Davis, one of the more poisonous little bitches in Slytherin, doesn't like that you and I are partnered in Potions, nor that we appear to actually get along while working. And so, because she's jealous of you, she started spreading rumours that the only reason I was nice to you was because you were willing to open your legs and lift your skirt. Malfoy and his goons, while eager to believe that you were a complete slag, were less understanding of why I should be friendly to you. As far as they're concerned, it's only acceptable to fuck a Mudblood bitch if you torture and kill her afterwards."

Hermione winced at the harsh words coming out of Blaise's mouth in a blank monotone, and went very still at his last sentence.

Finally, she asked, "What did they do?"

Blaise was silent for a long time, watching as the Ravenclaw team gradually descended back to earth, packed up, and started back towards the castle.

"They beat the shit out of me."

"How badly?" she asked.

Blaise was silent, so she turned and looked at him. "I want to see."

"No," he muttered, shaking his head. Hermione's mouth formed a grim line, her lips whitening against the pressure. She kept staring at him.

"It's bad," he continued, his eyes dropping.

"Clearly."

"Hermione, no. No."

She stared him down. Blaise sighed and ran his hands through his hair.

"Fine," he muttered, turning away, "but don't say I didn't warn you."

He carefully pulled his robe over his head and handed it to Hermione; she folded it in her lap, keeping it out of the dust. Blaise didn't meet her gaze as he pulled his jumper over his head, wincing only slightly. She took it from him, wordlessly, and waited as he undid the buttons of his shirt.

Slowly, more and more bruised skin was exposed. Hermione tried to stay calm, but when Blaise pulled the shirt back he grunted, and she could see a distinctly boot-shaped mark on his shoulder. With shaking hands she put his clothes on the ledge beside her, and stood up.

"You idiot," she whispered, staring at his chest. She circled him, and gritted her teeth at the livid bruises across his shoulders and down his back.

"You idiot, you _fucking_ idiot!" Hermione shrieked, almost in tears. "You could've been seriously hurt; you could've been put into a fucking coma. Blaise, they could've killed you!"

Blaise winced under her onslaught, but didn't defend himself.

"Now," she hissed, coming around to face him, "now you have to go to Dumbledore."

He shook his head.

"Blaise, this can't go on."

"Hermione, shut up," he snapped.

She stepped back, hurt and shocked.

"It can go on, and it will. This is my own fault, for not being careful enough." He looked up, an angry sneer distorting his features. "It's my fault for associating with a Gryffindor. And not just any Gryffindor, oh no! It had to be one of Potter's little followers, and a Mudblood at that!"

A resounding crack echoed through the empty room, and Hermione shook some life back into her hand. Blaise stood utterly still while a red handprint slowly appeared on his cheek.

"I deserved that," he muttered.

"Yes, you did."

He started to put his shirt back on, again refusing to meet Hermione's eyes.

"I'm sorry I slapped you Blaise, but I wanted to knock some sense into you before you said something really unforgivable. Unless, of course," she said, her eyes dropping, "you meant all that. About me."

"…I didn't."

Hermione shrugged, and handed him his jumper and robe. Blaise put his clothes on slowly, then took a tentative step towards the unhappy girl.

"Hermione…I don't regret being friends with you."

"If that's your idea of an apology, you'll have to do better," she said, turning away. Blaise sighed, and started pulling a few chairs free from the jumble of furniture.

"What are you doing?" Hermione asked.

"I'm going to try and transfigure these into something comfortable to sit on," he said, "but since I'm shit at transfiguration, they might end up in worse condition than they are now."

Hermione fought back a smile, and pulled out her wand. "Oh get out of the way. I'll do it."

The decrepit chairs were quickly replaced by two squashy armchairs - one gold, one crimson. Blaise raised an eyebrow at Hermione, who just shrugged.

The sat, facing each other. Hermione curled her legs underneath herself and watched Blaise closely for a moment. "If you don't mind my asking," she finally said, "why don't you really want to join Voldemort?"

"Because he's an idiot," Blaise said.

Hermione blinked at looked at him bemusedly. For the first time that evening, a faint smile graced Blaise's mouth, and he sat back, continuing.

"If you wanted to create a vicious, loyal and unstoppable army of evil, from which Hogwarts house would you recruit the majority of your minions?"

"Um…well, I suppose Slytherin -"

"Wrong! Everyone _always_ makes that mistake. Slyths are ambitious, for Merlin's sake. We crave power, and we'll do almost anything to get it. So why would you, as an Evil Overlord, surround yourself with followers whose loyalty is questionable at best, will try at every opportunity to oust you, and will abandon you at the first whiff of failure?"

Hermione stopped gaping at the obviousness of Blaise's argument, and asked, not without some scepticism, which house _he_ would choose.

"Hufflepuff," he said matter-of-factly.

"Hufflepuff?" she echoed.

"Yes. And I'll tell you why. The bloody Sorting hat says it every year, but apparently no one listens. Hufflepuffs are loyal and hardworking, and what better qualities could you look for in soldiers? They won't try and undermine you, or be preoccupied with their own interests. They work best in groups, and as general infantry, they would most likely be unstoppable. If the Dark Lord had concentrated on recruiting Huffs in the first place, you, my dear, would most likely be dead or rendered magic-less, and all us purebloods would be sporting very ugly tattoos."

Hermione nodded slowly. "Yes…I see your point."

"Of course you do. That's because it makes complete sense. Now, would you care to know why I think He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is going to get his arse kicked?"

She nodded.

"Cedric Diggory."

A look of revelation slowly crept across Hermione's face, and she looked at Blaise with admiration. "You're exactly right. Voldemort just alienated at least seven years worth of loyal followers. Probably more, in fact, because some of the older Hufflepuffs would have known Diggory when he was in the lower years."

Blaise nodded.

"And that is one of the main reasons I want nothing to do with him. He's powerful, very, very dangerous, and quite terrifying. But he's also completely and utterly insane. Grindelwald was insane, but in a far less melodramatic way, which was what made him so difficult to catch. It's a _damned_ good thing the two of them never had the chance to get together."

Hermione nodded slowly, and looked past Blaise, out the now-dark windows behind him. They lapsed into silence for a short while, each absorbed in their own thoughts, till something struck Hermione.

"Not all those bruises are new, are they?"

Blaise looked at her in surprise, and immediately she knew she was right.

"Of course they are," he said, waving a hand dismissively.

"Don't lie to me, Blaise. I'm something of an expert on bruises at this stage, considering my two best friends are boys. I've seen hundreds of Quidditch-inflicted injuries, mostly bruises, in various stages of healing over the past seven years."

His lips thinned slightly, and looked away.

"If you won't go to Dumbledore, then at least go to Snape. He'll help."

Blaise shook his head and stared morosely out the window.

Hermione sighed and got up. "Fine. If you won't, I will."

"No!" Blaise was on his feet in a second, one hand wrapped tightly around Hermione's wrist. "Don't. Promise you won't."

"Why should I?" she cried. "You wouldn't promise to go to him if it got worse, and this is certainly worse, so why should I promise you I won't go?"

"Because I need you to," he said quietly. She tugged her arm free and glared at him. "Hermione, please. Please don't."

She turned away, and crossed her arms, not letting him see the fear and sadness in her eyes. She certainly didn't want to go behind his back, but she was so afraid of what could happen to him, faced with the likes of Crabbe and Goyle, both of whom managed to dwarf his 6' frame.

His hands landed lightly on her shoulders, one thumb twisting gently around a wild curl of her hair.

"Alright," she whispered, "I won't."

* * *

Things continued in relative calm for the next week or so. Hermione and Blaise tried to avoid each other, wary of attracting more attention to themselves, and their relationship, than was necessary.

Their so-called relationship was another matter entirely. Hermione caught herself using that word once or twice in her internal monologue, and found it troubling. For a number of years now they had been friends, but since this…crisis had begun, she had realised she felt more for Blaise than the motherly concern she felt for Harry and Ron. Admittedly, that 'motherly concern' had been a bit uncertain in regards Ron till her 6th year. It was then that she realised, after a few weeks of uncomfortable fumbling in abandoned classrooms, that she and he were only ever going to be friends.

At first, she had thought the Blaise-thing (as she called it in her mind) was a similar situation, and would end equally disastrously, if she were to act on it. Which she wasn't about to. But after seeing him covered in bruises (_and half naked,_ a treacherous inner voice had added), she was certain there was more to it than her subconscious was letting on to. While she would have felt the same horror and anger and concern had it been Harry or Ron standing in front of her, there had been an added dimension. The fiercely _possessive_ need to protect and defend Blaise from further harm was quite new. She had felt something vaguely similar for Harry at the Third Task of the Triwizard Tournament; when he had disappeared, only to reappear over 40 minutes later, clutching Cedric Diggory's dead body.

As hard as Hermione tried, she couldn't find a satisfactory answer on her own, and knew she would be hard pressed to find a relevant book in the library. The week passed, in slow discomfort and awkwardness, and she knew that if she were an outside observer to this teenaged melodrama she'd be scoffing at the entire premise. But she began to nervously anticipate Potions, and wondered at every casual gesture Blaise made, every small remark her said. She decided, after a very distracting and trying class on Friday, that if this was what Lavender, Parvati and other girls always raved about, they were far loonier than she had ever guessed.

The weekend dragged out slowly, and feeling at the end of her rope, Hermione began to debate if she shouldn't ask Lavender if she could borrow her enormous collection of 'Witch Weekly'. Those things were supposed to offer relationship advice, weren't they? This lapse was only temporary - she quickly realised that any request like that would only raise giddy, giggling suspicion, which was that last thing she wanted to deal with.

Monday arrived and was hesitantly followed, as always, by Tuesday. Hermione both dreaded and anticipated its end - Potions was on Wednesday.

That morning, she could barely eat. Even reading was difficult, and despite his preoccupation with the upcoming Gryffindor vs. Slytherin match next weekend (the latter had, unsurprisingly, beaten Ravenclaw), Ron noticed she had been reading the same page of her Arithmancy book for 15 minutes.

Harry was still busy discussing strategy with Ginny (who, much to the surprise of her brothers, had turned out to be a very competent Quidditch player. She had pointed out that when one grows up with six older brothers, one picks up a few things. Like how to steal their brooms.) when Ron gently nudged Hermione with his elbow.

"Something's wrong," he said quietly, not expecting an answer. Hermione looked up and blushed, alarmed he had noticed how flustered she was.

"Oh, uh, it's nothing, I just have this assignment. For Potions. It's really hard, and it's making me just nervous," she muttered, stumbling a bit over the words.

Ron frowned, and lowered his voice further. "You're lying. I know you are, and you have been for weeks now. I just wish…" he trailed off, and scowled at the table. Before Hermione could gather her wits to respond, he stood up and stalked out of the Great Hall.

Harry and Ginny, finally distracted, looked after him in confusion.

"Where's he going?" Ginny asked. Harry looked at Hermione.

She just shrugged, stuffed her textbook in her satchel, and left.


	7. Chapter Six

**Disclaimer:** I own neither the characters nor the settings, which are all property of J.K. Rowling, and am making no profit from this little venture. The plot, however, is mine.

* * *

Hermione trotted into the Potions classroom behind the Ravenclaws. She slid into her seat and opened her textbook, ignoring everything in favour of the chapter that she _still_ couldn't seem to absorb properly. It was only when Snape swooped in and started the class that she noticed the seat beside her was empty.

"Sir?" she asked, raising her hand.

"Yes, Miss Granger?" Snape replied without turning around from the blackboard, where he was writing brief notes on neurotoxins.

"Where's Zabini?"

Snape paused for a moment, then continued writing a word. When he finished, he put down the chalk and turned to face the class. "Mister Zabini will not be attending class today. Now, who among you deigned to prepare properly for this class, and knows which creatures produce the deadliest neurotoxins?"

For once, Hermione did not raise her hand. As the rest of the class gave their answers (listing Peruvian Vipertooths, Lobalugs, Inland Taipans, Blue-Ringed Octopi, Streelers and Sydney Funnel Web Spiders), she sat in quiet puzzlement, which quickly turned into worry.

How she managed to get through the class she wasn't sure. Her hand seemed to automatically take notes, and her mouth to automatically answer on the one very surprising occasion when Snape actually called on her.

At the end of class, she mechanically packed up her things, walked out of the dungeons and made her way towards the Hospital Wing.

* * *

"You most certainly may _not_ see him!" Madam Pomfrey huffed. Hermione unsuccessfully tried to peer around her. "I've already told you, he's asleep now, and needs his rest," she continued, shooing Hermione towards the doors. "Perhaps, if you come back later, he'll be awake and able to receive visitors."

"But I just want to see him," Hermione pleaded, "and I want to know what happened!"

Madame Pomfrey paused, and looked closely at the girl in front of her. "His housemates insisted that he fell down a very steep flight of stairs."

With that, Hermione was pushed gently out the Hospital Wing doors, which shut firmly behind her. She debated trying to open them, but knew how stubborn the Healer could be if provoked.

As she walked slowly through the halls, back to Gryffindor Tower, Hermione tried to remember if she had seen Blaise at breakfast that morning. She wasn't sure, and kept in mind the fact that she'd left the Great Hall early. This of course, only brought her train of thought back around to Ron. She sighed, and dropped her head forward, letting her hair cover most of her face and ineffectively shield her from the rest of the world.

She had no idea what to do about him and Harry. She knew they were both aware that something wasn't right with her, and hadn't been for a while. But for three years now, she had managed to (or thought she had, until Malfoy's charming proposal in the library) conceal the fact that she and a Slytherin were in fact _not_ mortal enemies. Something far closer to the opposite end of that spectrum, really.

So now she faced a very serious dilemma - to tell or not to tell? Hermione was terrified at how the boys would react. And if she told them one part of it, she'd have to tell them all of it, including Malfoy's near-assault, Blaise's beatings and the fact that she had promised not to go to Snape, or any of the staff for that matter.

They wouldn't understand. She knew they wouldn't. It just wasn't in their nature; it wasn't _Gryffindor_. This, of course, made Hermione wonder if some Slytherin sentiment hadn't rubbed off on her over the past few years.

She simply couldn't tell them. And beyond the obvious fact that they'd both totally overreact, they would also probably go to Dumbledore, at the very least to try and have Blaise expelled for Harassing Their Hermione. She didn't want to break her promise, however inadvertently.

Hermione realised she had reached the Fat Lady. The painting looked down at her with mild concern, and asked "Password, dear?"

"Cuckoo clock," she muttered, and crawled through the opened portrait hole.

* * *

Dinner was a muted affair. Ron sat beside Harry, and barely spoke the entire meal. Nor did he so much as glance at Hermione, though she kept shooting shy, worried glances over to him, only to look away after a second, repelled by the stone-hard coldness of his face. She knew he was angry with her, and he had every right to be. But it only made things worse - she hated having to sit and try to eat while worrying about Blaise (who wasn't at supper) while at the same time feeling horrible that she couldn't be honest with her best friends.

The meal dragged on, and as soon as she thought she could escape she did, spouting lame excuses about Potions and Arithmancy essays. Harry just nodded and looked at her sadly, while Ron continued to ignore her. She fled.

Hermione escaped to the library for a while, but only because she didn't want to risk another run in with Pomfrey. With some effort, she managed to concentrate and finish a History of Magic paper that was due in a few days. She even managed to complete an Arithmancy assignment. For a short while, engrossed in magic and numbers and dates, and surrounded by the faint rustlings of paper and smell of knowledge, she let go of all of her worries and relaxed slightly. But when Madam Pince came around, shooing students out of the library because of the approaching curfew, any tranquillity Hermione had found slid away. Packing up her things, she set out for the Hospital Wing, worries and fears crowding out all other thoughts.

The Hospital Wing was very quiet; the only noise was a faint snuffling from a sleeping Slytherin second year who had had an allergic reaction to Hagrid's flobberworms. Luckily, he was at the far end of the room, and Pomfrey was no where to be seen. Hermione drifted closer to the white privacy sheets which flanked Blaise's bed. She poked her head nervously around a corner, only to see his wide blue eyes staring at her. He smiled, faintly, when he realised it was her.

"Hey," he whispered, "I hoped it would be you."

Hermione walked up the small aisle, between the mattress and the screen, to the head of the cot. She sat down carefully on the edge of the bed, and returned Blaise's small smile. "Who else would be creeping in here in the middle of the night to see you?"

His face immediately darkened. "Oh, you'd be surprised," he muttered, looking away.

Hermione paled at his insinuation. His hand, lying on the sheets beside her, clenched into a fist. Hermione put her own hand over it, squeezing gently. Blaise looked back at her in surprise, then, after an anxious moment, relaxed his fingers and wrapped them around hers, returning the pressure.

"How are you feeling?" she eventually asked.

"Better," he murmured.

They were both quiet for a while, till Hermione's curiosity got the better of her. "Blaise…what happened?"

He sighed, and looked down at his lap. "Malfoy happened."

Hermione waited, not wanting to say anything which might stop him from continuing.

"Last night, he had a little chat with me. And when I still expressed…reservations, he took it to mean that since I wasn't obviously for Volde - their cause, I was against it. Then Goyle and Crabbe arrived…" Blaise looked up at her. "You know, if it weren't for you, I probably would have given in ages ago."

"In that case, you're welcome," Hermione said, smiling weakly.

Blaise nodded. "Yes…I suppose you're right. But I'm…I'm afraid, Hermione."

"Of what?" she whispered, squeezing his hand tighter.

"Oh, lots of things," he said, not even trying to hide the bitterness in his voice. "That they're going to kill me, sooner rather than later. That they'll hurt my family, or anyone else I care about. That Gryffindors and Slytherins will never learn to live together in peace and bloody harmony."

"Be serious, Blaise," she chided, disturbed and unsettled by his blasé referral to his own death.

"I am being serious," said Blaise, his face suddenly sombre. "Those things do scare me."

Hermione squeezed his hand, terrified by the certainty that his fears were grounded in reality; she couldn't dismiss them anymore.

She looked away, thinking she might cry. She didn't want him to see her so upset - it wouldn't be fair to put that sort of burden on him now.

"Hermione," Blaise said quietly. When she didn't respond, he cupped her cheek with his free hand and gently brought her face around. He was silent, studying her face for a long moment. "I'm also afraid you won't let me kiss you."

A hiccupping sob broke loose from Hermione's throat, and after looking only slightly dismayed for a moment, Blaise pulled her into a tight hug, murmuring comforting nonsense. He kissed her forehead, cheeks, and once she had calmed down slightly, her lips, still holding her tightly and whispering softly. She returned his kisses hungrily, scared and needy and half in love.

Eventually, Hermione was quiet, and Blaise pulled away. He was grinning so widely, Hermione worried for a second that the top of his head might fall off.

"Wow," he finally said, looking down at her. "If I had known Gryffindors kissed liked this, I would have started in on your house a long time ago."

Hermione sniffed loudly and raised her eyebrows, fighting the urge to smile. She composed her face into a study of innocence, and asked "And what do Gryffindors kiss like, exactly?"

"Dementors," he said matter-of-factly, "but the non-soul draining kind. I think."

Hermione smacked his shoulder, and laughed as quietly as she could. "You're incorrigible," she finally murmured.

"Yes, I know," he purred, waggling his eyebrows. "I've wanted to kiss you for years, Hermione, but I didn't want to deal with the inevitable fall-out, and harassment from my charming house mates. But now, as I'm being harassed by them anyway, I reckon I haven't got much to lose."

Hermione raised an eyebrow at him. "Ah. So you never thought that I might turn you down? Or worried about what might happen to _me_ if you were to try anything?"

Blaise looked thoughtful for a moment, then smirked at her. "Absolutely not, and I never really bothered to think that far ahead."

Hermione swatted him again. He must have noticed the anger and hurt she was trying to hide, because he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead, and brushed her hair off her face. "I'm teasing. Of course I worried about those things. Believe me, I'm terrified that Malfoy will hurt you. It's all I can do to keep from throttling him every time I see his slimy rat-face. But I know that if I did, he would be completely exonerated, and Snape would make me the whipping boy of Slytherin." Blaise's face darkened, and he squeezed Hermione a bit tighter. She ran a hand soothingly along his arm.

"Perhaps he'd have to do that. Otherwise, Malfoy would run to his father and complain, which would only cast suspicion on Snape. Favour you, who hasn't taken the Mark and whose family never supported Voldemort, over Malfoy Jr., ring-leader of the Junior Death Eaters Society?"

Blaise sighed. "Whatever Snape's motives, I'd end up buggered."

Hermione rested her head against his chest, and listened to his heart beating. "We'll figure something out," she said finally.

Blaise silently kissed the top of her head, and buried his face in her hair.

* * *

Hermione never did find out the exact details of what happened to Blaise. He managed to avoid the topic of injuries, and she didn't have another chance to see him alone after Wednesday night.

Pomfrey finally released him from her tender ministrations on Friday, albeit very reluctantly. Hermione suspected that the matron had seen the older bruises on Blaise's body, and guessed what was happening. By the same token, she was certain Blaise would have come up with slick excuses for his battered condition, and stuck to the story provided by his fellow Slytherins.

She also noticed that Blaise had lost weight. It had been so gradual she couldn't see it until she had been away from him for a short while. His robes were looser, and his finely tailored shirts, which once fit perfectly, now seemed to hang off his shoulders. He looked too pale and worn when they finally had a chance to meet in an abandoned classroom after dinner, near the kitchens. However, his seeming ill health hadn't stopped him from vigorously accosting her the moment she slid through the door.

"Blaise!" she gasped out between laughs as his lips and tongue made a hot damp trail up her neck to her ear.

"Yes?" he murmured indistinctly, his mouth too busy nibbling on her earlobe to be concerned with petty issues such as proper pronunciation.

She pulled away and grinned. "Calm down! We have all evening."

"Yes, and I fully intend to take advantage of it, and you."

Hermione laughed again. Blaise took the opportunity to slip an arm around her waist and lead her towards an ancient brocaded sofa, which had seen better days, days which probably had involved much less dust.

Blaise pulled her close, and for a while, they forgot about the rest of the world. Shirts were unbuttoned, and robes discarded altogether. Shoes were kicked off and socks rolled down.

"What on earth are you doing now?" Hermione asked, when Blaise kissed each of her toes in turn. He didn't answer, just ran his lips lightly over the arch of her left foot. "I-I'm ticklish! If you keep d-doing that, I swear I'll kick you," she gasped out between laughs. He only grinned, and licked her ankle. In retaliation, she squirmed out of his grasp, and began to wrestle him out of his shirt.

Blaise yelped, and fought back. But because he had lost weight, and was weaker than he might once have been, Hermione didn't realise he was trying in earnest to fend her off. She just laughed as he turned to scramble away, and pulled his collar down and towards her. The top few buttons of shirt were already undone, and the shirt slid down and back, revealing much of his back.

Hermione gasped and immediately let go of the shirt. Low down on his spine, looking as though it had been carved into his skin with a knife, was an imperfect copy of the Dark Mark.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Disclaimer:** I own neither the characters nor the settings, which are all property of J.K. Rowling. I'm not making any money from this, just wasting time, so please don't sue.

* * *

"What have you done?" she whispered.

Blaise spun around and struggled back into his shirt. "Hermione, calm down, please –"

"Calm down?" she yelled, cutting him off. "_Calm down?!_"

"It's nothing, it's not important, it's not even real," Blaise babbled, trying desperately to quiet her.

"The Dark Mark is carved into your back, and it's _nothing?_" She hissed as she pulled her shoes and socks on.

"Please Hermione –"

Before he could even finish his sentence, she had pulled her robe over her head, and was out the door. By the time Blaise had dressed and made it out into the corridor, she was gone.

* * *

For four days, she avoided him. She neither met his eye nor lingered near enough to him that words might be exchanged. Any note pressed into her hand or slipped into her satchel was flushed down the toilet without ever having been read.

Hermione was furious, true, but there was more to it. She was also terrified, miserable and confused, but, above all, she felt horribly, horribly betrayed.

She simply couldn't understand why Blaise wouldn't tell her about the thing on his back. And how could Pomfrey have missed it? Did they hold him down and do it, or did he let them, wanting the Mark somewhere no one would see it? She knew Snape's was on his inner forearm, but she had never actually seen it – in the Hospital Wing, after the Triwizard Tournament, he had only shown it to Fudge. Maybe it was supposed to be cut into the skin?

After indulging all her worst fears and most shameful suspicions for a few days, letting them turn into nightmare scenarios which kept her awake for most of the night, she realised she was being foolish and impractical.

She may well have been at the centre of a complex, years-long Slytherin plot to gradually win her trust and affection, and then use that advantage to manipulate her in hopes of using her in some dastardly way, but Hermione had never been known to suffer megalomania, or such extreme bouts of imagination.

So finally, sometime early Wednesday morning, after many long, dark hours, she decided to take the only logical step.

She would talk to Snape.

* * *

7:30am came far too soon for Hermione's liking. She rolled out of bed, happy she had decided to wash her hair the night before. Regardless of how many times she practiced, she was never truly satisfied with her drying charm. It just seemed to make her hair frizz out more than usual. As she brushed her teeth, she wondered what Harry and Ron would say about her not having completely perfected a charm, let alone one as simple as a drying spell. This thought was accompanied with a pang of guilt.

She had been keeping so much from them, and she knew she was worrying them with her odd behaviour. All her excuses had become trite and worn out, and Ron still wasn't speaking to her. Harry only looked unhappy, which added an extra shadow to his already haunted eyes – Voldemort had been eerily quiet for the past few months, and the entire Wizarding world was holding its breath and watching The Boy Who Lived, as though he was some sort of evil divining rod.

Hermione hated to think that she was adding to the mountain of stress and fear heaped on one of her best friends. She ate breakfast quickly, listening as Ginny coolly outlined all the faults of her most recent ex-boyfriend, a Quidditch-playing Ravenclaw, known for both his good looks and his surprisingly un-scholarly attitude.

Arithmancy was slow, and Hermione found it very difficult to concentrate on the lecture. Her bottom lip was chewed to shreds by the time the class was finally over. She hid deep in the stacks of the library over lunch, her stomach too twisted and tight to want food. But Potions was by far the worst – both she and Blaise were stiff and awkward, their normal grace and anticipation of each other stilted and forced. And while Snape nodded his caustic approval of their concoction at the end of the period, Hermione felt that their complex and delicate Anaesthesium potion was barely passable, at best.

Dinner came and went, and Hermione felt like a rock in the river of conversation, as sentences split and flowed around her. Once the meal was finished, rather than following the steady trickle of her housemates up the stairs to Gryffindor Tower, Hermione slipped up to the library, and waited. She didn't want to bump into any marauding Slytherins, particularly in the dungeons. Finally, after an hour of anxious stalling, she left the library and headed down the main staircase.

* * *

The dungeons were cold and full of odd shadows, so Hermione hurried along the corridor, trying to calm her stomach by reciting the twelve uses of dragon's blood. She knew Snape's office was beside his classroom, and he was usually in one place or the other most evenings, supervising detentions. As she approached, she saw that the door to the classroom was open, allowing torchlight to spill into the hallway, painting the dark stone floors orange. After taking a moment to thrust her chin forward and her shoulders back, Hermione walked into the room.

Snape was, unsurprisingly, at his desk, alternately marking papers and barking instructions at a 5th year Hufflepuff who was apparently doing a very poor job of scrubbing out dirty cauldrons. Both he and Snape looked up in surprise at Hermione.

"Can I help you, Miss Granger?" Snape said with disdain, clearly expecting some sort of request for extra credit work, or more homework.

"I don't know, sir. I hope so." Hermione said quietly.

Snape narrowed his eyes and watched her carefully for a moment. He nodded, and then glared at the Hufflepuff. "I don't recall telling you to take a break, Summerby. I expect to you to have at least five of those cauldrons spotless by the time I return, or you'll be serving detention with Mr. Filch for the rest of the week."

The boy started scrubbing frantically, and Snape stood up and slid around his desk. He swept through the room and past Hermione out into the corridor. She trotted after him, wringing her hands together nervously.

She followed him into his office, and stood awkwardly by a chair in front of his desk as he shut the door. Snape swept past her and settled into his chair. He looked at her for a beat, and sighed.

"Sit down, Miss Granger. That's what the chair is for."

Hermione perched on the seat and stared down at her hands. She could feel Snape's eyes boring into the top of her head.

"As entertaining as this is, I do have work to do, so please get on with it," he finally snapped, startling Hermione into looking up.

"Sir...I...I don't know how to say this."

Snape rolled his eyes and made an irritated noise in the back of his throat.

"I'm sorry," she continued, staring at her lap again, "it's just that this is a...delicate topic, and I don't want to put anyone in danger."

Snape was silent, and Hermione finally looked up at him. He was watching her, concentration or concern creasing his brow.

"You have my attention, Miss Granger," Snape said quietly. "And I would hope that by this point you would understand that as a professor at Hogwarts who works for Headmaster Dumbledore, you can place a certain degree of trust in me. However, you must also realise that I'm not known for my patience, so either speak or leave."

Hermione sat up a little straighter, partially with indignation at his innuendo that she still bore childish grudges, despite Snape's work for the Order. Reminding herself that Gryffindors were known for their bravery, she spoke: "There's someone I'm worried about."

Snape raised an eyebrow. "If you're referring to Potter, I'm absolutely certain Professor McGonagall would be a better counsellor than I. So if you don't mind –"

"It's not about Harry. It's...someone else. Someone in Slytherin."

Snape sat back in his chair, and looked at Hermione closely. She took it as a sign to proceed.

"I think he's in danger, but I'm not sure if that's entirely true, and it could have something to do with Voldemort. And that means it would be Order business, I do know that, but he's also still a student, and since he's in your house, I thought I should come to you."

Hermione paused and took a breath. Snape was watching her coldly, but didn't make any move to speak, so she continued. "He doesn't want to go to Dumbledore, and has refused to speak to anyone, you included. And for a while things weren't too bad, so it didn't really matter. But lately everything's been getting worse, and I just didn't know what to do. And I know Dumbledore couldn't really help, because the Slytherins all can't stand him. But you...you're the only one who really looks out for them."

Snape's eyes widened briefly at Hermione's last statement, and she felt a flash of shame for the way Slytherin House had been treated. That feeling was quickly pushed aside, replaced with anger. It was too easy to blame Voldemort, biased parents, the ignorance of the Wizarding World in general and Snape for coddling all the little vipers. Far easier, in fact, than thinking about how most of the students of the other houses, and even some of the staff members, vilify and ostracise Slytherins, and how, rather than trying to reach out to them, treat them like monsters rather than children who, for the most part, simply don't know any better. It was too painful for Hermione to think that she was partially responsible for Malfoy, and for what happened to Blaise.

"Sir, I'm afraid they're going to seriously hurt him."

"Who is?" Snape said suddenly, catching Hermione off-guard. He had brought his elbows to rest on the table in front of him and now he steepled his fingers together, in front of his chest. That, combined with the intense and faintly warning tone of voice set off a siren inside Hermione's head, but she was too stubborn to back down.

"Well...the other Slytherins, sir. Malfoy and his goons."

"Miss Granger, you are very wrong in assuming that I am at all unaware of what goes on in my house. If any one of my students were in real and imminent danger, I would intercede on their behalf in any way I could. I can appreciate your concern, but there is nothing to be done. So if you don't mind, I have work to do." Snape began gathering a pile of parchments together, and Hermione knew she had been dismissed. It was all she could do to keep her jaw from dropping.

"But...sir, he's your student..."

"Yes, I'm aware of that," Snape said, still not looking up at her.

_He's going to leave, and he won't do anything, and Blaise will be killed_, she thought. Hermione's hands clenched into fists, and the anger which had slowly been bubbling up inside her through the entire conversation reached critical mass.

"You coward! You're just going to let them kill him, aren't you? You couldn't be arsed to even lift a finger to save him – you're more concerned with protecting horrible little bastards like Malfoy!"

Snape continued to stare impassively at her from across his desk. The only indication that he even heard her outburst was one raised eyebrow. He linked his fingers together in front of him, and began to speak.

"Miss Granger, you are a Gryffindor, and as such are prone to not only jumping to conclusions, but also to inserting both of your feet into your mouth at the same time. But, luckily for you, I will _not_ give you a permanent detention for what you just said, nor take so many points from Gryffindor that your blasted house will have to struggle for years just to get its points back into positive numbers. But let me make this perfectly clear – you have _no_ comprehension of the levels upon which Slytherin House operates.

"If I were to openly protect Zabini – don't look so dismayed girl, I knew you were referring to him the entire time – I would not only sign my own death warrant but his as well, _and_ lose the trust and respect of those children I was in the process of turning away from the...dominant ideology within my house. So no, I can't help him, not outwardly. He needs to help himself."

Snape sat back and watched the colour drain slowly out of Hermione's face. She looked down at her now slack hands.

"And in regards Malfoy," he continued, "he is still a child, and in my care. As such, I have a duty to protect him as well, and to hopefully impart some knowledge in the process."

Hermione wasn't really listening, but Snape's last sentence caught her attention. She looked up, slightly bemused.

"Impart some knowledge...?" she repeated, her eyes widening. "Of course. You have to act in such a way that when he reports to his father, you come across as a loyal disciple of Voldemort."

Snape smiled faintly and pushed his chair back. He leant back and linked his fingers together, resting his hands in his lap. "What an interesting idea, Miss Granger. You should return to your tower now, before you end up being out after curfew, and I am forced to take points."

Hermione shook her head. "I think I'm finally beginning to understand all of what you do for the Order. That doesn't mean I have to like it, or accept it."

Snape's eyes widened suddenly, then narrowed. Hermione noticed that his hands, still clasped loosely in front of him, began to constrict till his knuckles turned white.

"Frankly, I don't care if you like it or not. Now, it's time for you to leave."

"You can't dismiss me that easily!" she cried. "What about Blaise! You can't just allow them to keep on hurting him!"

Snape stood up so quickly his chair almost toppled backwards. He glared down at her, and Hermione instinctively shrank back, suddenly very afraid.

"Perhaps, Miss Granger," he hissed through gritted teeth, "I am not the one in a position to protect Zabini. _I_ am not the reason his housemates are rejecting him – you are."

Hermione stared at him in horror for a long moment. Then she jumped out of her chair and ran out the door and down the corridor. Her mind was buzzing with hatred towards Snape for repeating what Blaise had said, but without the anger and fear that had been in the boy's voice which had allowed her to dismiss it then.

And while she was running away from Snape and his damnable talent for seeing the truth, too furious to think or question what she had seen and observed, Snape strode around his desk and firmly shut the door behind her.

She didn't see his face twisting in pain, nor his left arm twitching and shaking. She didn't see him release the wards on the door into his private rooms, and stride quickly through them, _Accio_'ing a black, hooded robe and featureless mask as he went. She didn't see him scribbling, sealing and heavily warding a note to Dumbledore, and she certainly didn't see him leaving through the secret passage which led to a small copse of trees, just inside the main gates.


	9. Chapter Eight

**Disclaimer:** I own neither the characters nor the settings, which are all property of J.K. Rowling. I'm not making any money from this, just wasting time, so please don't sue.

* * *

Hermione did not sleep that night. Some time around 4am, she realised there was nothing left for her to do. She had been desperately hoping that Snape would somehow fix everything, that Malfoy would be sent marching out the front door of the school while Dumbledore and Snape looked on sternly, unforgiving fingers pointed out into the empty, snow-covered highlands. After all, Snape was one of the good guys, wasn't he? He was on their side, and by all rights, as a trustworthy adult, he should have fixed everything. Wasn't that what adults were supposed to be _for_?

Hermione finally had to face the harsh reality – something she had been avoiding since the adventures of her first year at Hogwarts. This was not some fairy tale, and there was no happy ending waiting for an appropriately dramatic moment to arrive. Adults were no wiser than children, and on that note, could Hermione really consider herself a child any longer? She was 17. She had less than a year left in school. Once June arrived, that would be it.

In all likelihood, Harry was going to die. Blaise would probably face the same fate, as would countless others – friends, peers, teachers, enemies and complete strangers were all going to die, if Voldemort chose to exercise the power the entire Wizarding World knew he had.

And where did that leave her? Hermione stared at the familiar underside of the canopy above her bed. She realised that if she survived to see her early twenties, she would be lucky. And even then, most of the people she knew and loved would probably be dead.

Alone in the dark, Hermione began to cry.

* * *

Hermione woke early the next morning, before the Lavender's alarm clock could wrench her out of sleep. She padded to the bathroom, and, without looking into the mirror, turned the cold tap on one of the sinks to full. She cupped the freezing water in her hands, and splashed it over her face, washing away the feverish aftermath of tears and unsettling dreams. 

Shoulders hunched close about her, she rested her hands on the edge of the sink and stared into the mirror.

"No more silliness," she muttered. "Time to act your age, Hermione. Time to sort it all out." Without giving the mirror a chance to answer, she headed for the shower.

* * *

The next few days passed Hermione by quickly. She felt as though events were moving in fast-forward – people flickered past her, lectures took minutes, and the sun raced across the sky, finally visible through the grey clouds at the end of the week.

After dinner on Friday night she waffled over returning to the common room. She found herself afraid that she would be bogged down by mundane conversation, or worse, that Harry and Ron would corner her and demand answers she couldn't give. She decided the library was the safest bet, and stayed there, hidden deep in the stacks, till Madame Pince found her and tersely informed her it was five minutes before curfew.

Accepting defeat, Hermione thanked the librarian and, with heavy feet, headed towards Gryffindor Tower. She trudged to the main stairwell, and waited for a suitable staircase. After a few minutes, she finally got fed up and stepped onto the first one to stop in front of her. It took her in the completely wrong direction, but up a flight. She hopped off, and gradually, circuitously, made her way up the floors, succeeding only in getting dizzy and confused. She paused on a landing, and realised she had somehow passed the seventh floor. Irritated now, she hopped on the first staircase that came by.

It swung around immediately, and for a moment it seemed the be heading in the right direction, only to veer past the correct hallway at the last minute and settle on one going in the opposite direction.

Hermione rushed up the steps and jumped off anyways, not wanting to tempt fate further. As she caught her breath, she realised she was already half way to the Astronomy Tower.

She closed her eyes and leant against the cold stone wall, weighing the likelihood of a class being there, as well as the possibility of being caught, against her strong desire to simply think, alone, where she knew she would not be bothered.

The desire for solitude won out, and hefting her satchel higher up on her shoulder, Hermione headed away from Gryffindor Tower.

* * *

The satchel made a dull, forgotten thud when dropped on to the flagstones that paved the Astronomy Tower. A few clouds hurried across the sky, but lower down the night wind was gentle, almost tender. Hermione was oblivious to it's playful tugging at her hair. She sat down, cross-legged, and tried to ignore the cold of the stones soaking through her jeans.

"A pleasant evening, wouldn't you say?"

Hermione jumped to her feet as Dumbledore separated from the shadows to her right and walked slowly towards her.

"Headmaster! I, I was…I was just going to…um…"

Dumbledore chuckled and patted her shoulder gently. "It's quite alright. Years ago, when I myself was a student at Hogwarts, I would often sneak up here to think. It's comforting to realise there is something bigger than oneself."

Dumbledore swung his arm in a wide, upwards arc as he spoke, indicating to the sky. Hermione followed the trail his fingers led, and realised with a start that that was the exact reason she so enjoyed coming up to the Astronomy Tower. She smiled slightly at the Headmaster, and nodded, before looking back up at the sky. They were both quiet for a moment.

"How did you know I'd be here, sir?" Hermione finally asked.

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Well, suffice it to say, the staircases can be quite amendable when asked to help carry out a trick, of sorts."

Hermione had to make a conscious effort to stop her mouth from hanging open. "Wait, you mean to say you coaxed the staircases into herding me up here? Why?"

Dumbledore's expression became sombre. "I felt it was a less intimidating means than simply asking you into my office."

Hermione, looked at him in alarm.

"Is there anything you might like to talk to me about, Miss Granger?" Dumbledore asked gently.

Her eyes widened. _He knows,_ she thought. _Snape has told him, and he knows._

Snape suddenly became the vilest person on the planet, and Hermione scowled at the pavement.

"No, Professor Snape has not had a chance to approach me yet," Dumbledore said calmly. "He was…called away on urgent business shortly after you met with him Monday night, and has been kept busy for most of the week."

Hermione opened and closed her mouth, then opened it again.

"Sir, is there anything that goes on in Hogwarts that you aren't aware of?"

Dumbledore smiled, but the ever-present twinkle in his blue eyes was dimmer than usual. "Of course. I am not omnipotent, merely very good at paying attention."

Hermione nodded and looked down at her hands, which she was wringing together nervously.

"There is something I'd like to ask you, sir," she said quietly. "Why aren't you doing anything to protect him? He's one of us, or, at the very least, he could be, were you to give him a chance. He doesn't deserve all this."

Hermione had kept her voice level and her eyes on her twisting fingers throughout her small speech, but now, having finished, she looked up, afraid Dumbledore would be angry or disappointed, or, worst of all, apathetic.

But, rather than being any of those things, the old Headmaster looked sad and worn. Hermione felt her breath catch in her throat, as a desperate, hesitant hope began to swell up inside of her.

"My dear child," Dumbledore said quietly, "there is nothing I can do."

Slowly, Hermione deflated. She nodded dumbly, and blindly began to reach for her bag. Dumbledore held the satchel up, but as she raised her arm to take it, he quietly said, "Before you go, Miss Granger, please allow me to explain."

Too numb to speak, Hermione nodded.

"I have known of the situation for a while now. Professor Snape keeps me well informed of the goings on in Slytherin House. While your friend seemed to be handling himself admirably, the past few years have been fraught with danger for many witches and wizards, both students and adults, and sadly he has been no exception.

"Please do not think I have stood idly by. I have tried to speak with your friend's parents, but they have flatly refused any request at a meeting. They are aware that the position they occupy is just as precarious as that of their son, and are eager to avoid anything that may make them a target. For the most part, they are out of the country and are simply unreachable.

"Without his parents permission, Hermione," Dumbledore said quietly, "there is no safe action left for me to take. If I were to remove Blaise and place him under my protection, he would be hunted both mercilessly and tirelessly by Voldemort's followers, as an out-and-out traitor to their cause. His position would be more dangerous than Harry's. It would also place his family in grave danger. By taking action against the offending students, the same thing would occur.

"Keeping Blaise among the other Slytherins is the safest place for him to be. His housemates will not kill him. They will not, and cannot."

"How do you know that?" Hermione said quietly, her arms wrapped tightly around herself. "How can you possibly know they won't kill him?"

"They can't, child," Dumbledore said. "You know there are protective wards around the entire school. Killing magic can not be cast here."

"Who says they'll kill him magically?" Hermione whispered, staring at the ground.

Dumbledore sighed, and rested a hand on her hunched shoulder.

"Professor Snape will protect him, regardless of his harsh words. Have faith in him."

* * *

A few more days passed. Hermione was manic, throwing herself into assignments and essays with a ferocity not often seen. She ignored everything, intent on keeping her mind always busy, always working. But at night, when her subconscious had control, her dreams were filled with corpses and blood, empty eyes and shrieked "Avada Kedavra!"s. 

The one bright spot in her life was that Ron had apparently decided to forgive her. He had grudgingly asked her how she was at breakfast one morning, while Harry looked on anxiously.

She had smiled, shyly, and said she was feeling better. Ron had returned the smile, and it seemed she was back in the fold. Things were still strained, and she knew that the boys were still confused and hurt at her evasiveness. She wished desperately she could tell them everything, pour out the sordid tale in a long gush of whispers in some secret, hidden spot. Then, as had always happened before, they could form a plan of attack, and save the day – the Golden Trio bravely beating back the darkness.

But that was not possible, and Hermione knew it. The boys wouldn't, _couldn't_ understand. And she didn't blame them for it. All the Slytherins they had had close contact with were spiteful and nasty, and, once upon a time, Hermione would have shared every one of their biases and prejudices. But now, knowing Blaise, and remembering how he and the other Slytherins had viewed the Gryffindor triumph of their 1st year Leaving Feast made her uncertain. And then there was Snape.

Hermione wasn't quite sure what to make of him. She knew he was brilliant and brave, but he was also cruel and, at times, very, very petty. And, unlike what most other non-Slytherin students believed, he was not a sneering, repulsive puppet, controlled by his Slytherins and their parents.

She tried not to dwell on Snape too much. It only made her angry and frustrated that he wouldn't help Blaise. Rationally, she knew it wasn't within his power, but that didn't stop her from being dreadfully angry with the man.

But there was no time for reflection any more. It was Friday, two weeks before the end of the term, and Hermione was heading for Potions. The reconciliation with Ron and Harry had given her some small hope, and a bit more courage. She was resolved to speak to Blaise today, and to try to sort everything out.


	10. Chapter Nine

**Disclaimer:** Nothing but the plot is mine, and I'm not making any sort of profit at Rowling's expense (not like she hasn't got enough money already). Basically, don't sue me, as I haven't got anything to take.

* * *

  
The last three weeks of Potions had been dreadful. Ever since she had stopped speaking to Blaise upon discovering the Mark on his back, their scholastic performance had suffered. Not to the point that they had directly failed any in-class assignments. Rather, their potions had been mediocre at best, which was really not acceptable at the N.E.W.T. level. Snape had, unsurprisingly, been quite nasty about it. Hermione knew it was a role he had to play, but she was hard-pressed to remain sensible about the whole situation.

But today was going to change all that. She and Blaise couldn't continue on like this. She was loath to leave him as he was now, alone and friendless. She doubted that her permanent departure from his life would make any difference to his housemates now. No, the damage there had already been done, and it was her fault.

_So I'll be the one to rectify it,_ she had told herself fiercely.

She marched into the classroom and sat down beside Blaise. He was, as usual, staring blankly at the sheet of parchment in front of him on the desk. After looking around quickly to make sure no one was watching them, Hermione slid her hand under the table and lightly touched Blaise's leg.

He nearly jumped out of his skin, and looked at her, his eyes wide with surprise. She shook her head very slightly, in warning, and he contrived to look normal, letting his gaze wander around the room – he understood the need for secrecy.

Their work was infinitely better that class, and their finished potion (a thick, shining green liquid, shot with twisting threads of gold that danced across the surface like an oil sheen) matched Snape's description exactly, right down to the faint scent of lavender in the pale smoke wafting off its surface.

Snape made no comment to Hermione, but did mutter "Good" to Blaise.

As the students began to gather their things and head towards the door, Hermione slipped a torn corner of parchment into Blaise's book bag.

It read '4th floor hallway, 6th door on the right. Sat. 12am.'

* * *

On Saturday night, Hermione arrived early. The charm she had cast weeks ago on two of the old, rotting chairs had long since worn off, so she recast the spell. After a staring at the newly-transfigured squashy armchairs for a moment, she flicked her wand at them and their respective colours changed from maroon and gold to silvery grey and dark green.

Satisfied, Hermione sank into the grey one, and pulled her legs up underneath her body.

She didn't have to wait long – Blaise arrived early as well, around quarter to. He didn't seem surprised to see she was already there, but the colour of the chairs made him smile in spite of himself.

He dropped into the green armchair, and regarded Hermione with serious eyes.

"You asked, and I came. It was more than you were willing to do for me," he said with surprising bluntness. Hermione simply nodded, waiting for him to ask what she wanted. But Blaise seemed determined to make things difficult for her. He just stared at her, and to Hermione, his pale eyes seemed to be full of regret and accusation.

When she started fidgeting with her robe and chewing on her bottom lip, she wondered if this wasn't just some subtle, Slytherin form of torture.

"I'm sorry," she finally blurted out.

Blaise smiled slightly. "I know."

Hermione sighed in exasperation. But she should have known better than to expect anything more from a Slytherin.

"I was…scared," she admitted, while inwardly chastising herself for still fidgeting. She laced her fingers tightly together and kept her hands firmly in her lap.

"I wasn't sure what to do, or what to make of your…cut," she said lamely, not sure what to call the Dark Mark that was crudely carved into the small of his back. "And even after I came to the conclusion that it couldn't have been done voluntarily, it was still…a lot to deal with. I didn't know what to do, or how to help you. I just…I didn't know what to do."

Hermione looked down at her hands in her lap, and realised that her grip had slowly been tightening. Her laced fingers were digging into each other, the knuckles white. She took a deep breath and forced her hands to relax.

"I don't blame you for wanting to run away," Blaise said quietly, startling Hermione into looking up at him.

He was staring out the window, at the snow-covered grounds. December had arrived a short while ago, bringing with it a thick layer of snow, which had covered Hogwarts for days.

"This isn't really your problem. I simply should never have been friendly to you, or allowed myself to do what my hormones were telling me to. I liked you, and I let it get the better of my judgement."

Hermione winced at the carefully masked bitterness in his voice.

"Don't say that," she sighed. "You shouldn't have to think that way."

"Perhaps not. But that's simply how it is," Blaise said quietly, still not looking at Hermione.

Tentatively, she untwined her fingers and placed a hand gently on his knee. "I want to help," she said.

Blaise stood up quickly, brushing her hand away without a glance. As he was walking away, he said over his shoulder, "Then stay away."

Hermione sat in the musty, dark room for ten minutes after Blaise left. It would have looked quite bad, had they been seen leaving together. She sat quietly, too numb to be hurt or upset.

_Well,_ she thought, _that's it then._

After what she judged to be a sufficient amount of time, she calmly removed the charms from the chairs, hefted her book bag over her shoulder, and walked out of the room.

* * *

Christmas break was only a week away and the castle was filled with festive cheer, but Hermione barely acknowledged it. She had tentatively begun to interact with her housemates again, shyly attempting to brush over her anti-social behaviour of the past three months.

Harry and Ron were pleased, and that in turn pleased Hermione. They still treated her delicately though, afraid of doing anything that would bring back the secretive, exhausted and ghost-like girl they had puzzled and worried over since October.

But Hermione had no intention of reverting. She mourned the loss of Blaise's company and affection privately, and she sometimes found herself returning to the room on the fourth floor hallway. She liked to sit at the window, and imagine Blaise was going to open the door behind her at any moment, and come in and put his arms around her. She knew it was foolish and incredibly unlikely, but she kept imagining it anyway.

The day before the students were piled into the Hogwarts Express to be trundled back to their families for the holidays, Hermione found herself wandering back to the fourth floor hallway. She slipped inside the sixth door on right, and shut it quietly behind her.

She had wondered many times if Blaise had been coming back here during this long, lonely week, but once she had thought logically about it, she found it hard to convince herself that he would take such a foolish, Gryffindor-like risk. Still, the faint hope persisted.

She walked over to one of the windows, and propped a roll of parchment on its ledge. The letter had no names in it, and had been written with a Dicto-Quill. While it was extraordinarily unlikely that anyone other than herself or Blaise would be in this abandoned room, Hermione had no desire to take any chances.

The letter was simple, and straight-forward. It read:

_Perhaps, when we've left Hogwarts, we might try to make a proper go of things. I miss you._

Hermione looked down at the roll of parchment, and hesitated. Should she have written more? Would that short, brief note be enough? Should she have told him that she…that she what?

Hermione shook her head, turned, and left the room. She shut the door firmly behind her, and went to pack.

* * *

The Christmas holidays were pleasant and uneventful, but the black cloud hanging over Hermione's head simply would not dissipate. She insisted that there was no problem when her parents asked what was wrong, and she smiled, and nodded, and engaged in polite conversations with all her relatives.

After a week, once Christmas Day had passed, she began to relax. If anything had happened, someone would have told her. Dumbledore, or possibly McGonagall. Or even Ron, simply sending news of new Death Eater activity.

But no bleak messages came. Hermione allowed herself to begin to enjoy her holidays, and even fancied Blaise had found her note, and was regretting his hasty choice. This feeling of girlish nervousness was not wholly new to her – she remembered feeling something vaguely familiar towards Gilderoy Lockhart in her second year, but that hardly counted.

Hermione wondered, not for the first time, if she wasn't in love with the strange, dark Slytherin boy.

It was simply too much to dwell on, and she concentrated on more tangible and mundane pursuits – studying. Holidays or no, this was her N.E.W.T. year.

* * *

Hermione met Harry and Ron at King's Cross Station the Sunday before the start of term at Hogwarts. The boys had both been at 12 Grimmauld Place for the holidays, and were rather pleased to be returning to Hogwarts, Harry particularly so. The old house had remained a painful place for him, filled with reminders of what Sirius had endured and mocking hints at what could have been.

Regardless, they were pleased to be reunited, and the train trip passed quickly as they swapped stories and showed off gifts.

It was late when the Hogwarts Express pulled into Hogsmeade station, and they all piled tiredly into a thestral-drawn carriage. The carriages rattled slowly up to the school in a long, serpentine line, and methodically disgorged their occupants at the front doors. Inside it was warm, and full of students dragging or levitating trunks towards their respective dormitories. In the confusions, Hermione didn't see Blaise.

_But,_ she reasoned, _he may well have arrived before me, or may still be in a carriage._

Satisfied, she followed Harry and Ron up the stairs towards Gryffindor Tower, her trunk bobbing along behind her.

* * *

Dinner was a muted affair that evening. Hermione arrived slightly early, and positioned herself so that she could see across to Great Hall to the Slytherin table. She watched as students trickled in, and every member of Slytherin was noted and disregarded in turn.

Finally, once dinner had begun, Hermione sat staring, puzzled, at the door.

He hadn't shown up.

_There's a logical reason,_ she told herself. _Perhaps he's sick?_

But deep down, in the pit of her no-longer-hungry stomach, Hermione knew something was very, very wrong.

The other Gryffindors ate and spoke around her, giving her the occasional odd glance. Finally, Harry reached across the table and touched the back of her hand. She nearly jumped out of her skin, but mustered a weak smile for the confused, worried boy.

"Sorry," she said. "I was just wool-gathering." Harry didn't look convinced, so Hermione began to load up her plate, and gave every impression of tucking in until he looked away.

She picked at her meal for a little while, until Ron started watching her out of the corner of his eye. So she forced herself to eat, and found she had an appetite after all.

She ate until she felt sick with fullness, stuffing herself and trying not to think too much. She looked up, and saw a small group of second year Slytherins were leaving the table. Standing quickly, she hurried after them, and silently praised her luck when one fell behind, stopping to tie a shoe.

"Hey," she said quietly, catching up with the child.

The Slytherin looked up at her, and a mixture of disgust and fear crossed his face. "What do you want?" he said, settling for resigned disdain.

"Where's Blaise Zabini?" she asked as her stomach began to twist into knots, wishing she hadn't eaten so much.

The little second year looked absolutely terrified for a moment, but masked his reaction quickly.

"He's not here. He didn't come back," he hissed, before hurrying away down to the dungeons.


	11. Chapter Ten

**Disclaimer:** Nothing but the plot is mine, and I'm not making any sort of profit at Rowling's expense (not like she hasn't got enough money already). Basically, don't sue me, as I haven't got anything to take.

* * *

For Hermione, the next five days passed in a confused blur. She barely ate, barely slept, and couldn't concentrate on much of anything. Harry and Ron were beside themselves with worry – she knew because they had threatened to go to McGonagall unless, on Wednesday, she had something more substantial than a cup of sweet tea for breakfast. Too numb to fight them, she ate a plate of scrambled eggs and bacon dutifully, only to run, fifteen minutes later, to the bathroom, where she promptly threw up.

Classes were far worse. As the days slowly passed the bags under her eyes grew heavier and her face grew thinner, and it was hard not to notice. Even without Harry and Ron's interference, McGonagall began watching Hermione at meals and in class, worry lines wrinkling her forehead. But she never approached her.

_Perhaps,_ Hermione thought, one sleepless night, _Dumbledore told her that I was asking about Blaise. He could have told her to keep an eye out for me._

But she couldn't really bring herself to care. So what if anyone knew? It hadn't made any difference before the Christmas break, and it made no difference now.

_If only I'd sent an owl,_ she thought, constantly. Perhaps then she could have realised something was wrong, the Aurors could have been alerted, they would have had a fresher trail to follow, and maybe Blaise would still be –

She could never bring herself to finish that thought. She scolded herself for imagining the worst possible outcome. He could be alive, and he may well be returned to her. She repeated that to herself, through the long nights.

Eventually, Friday came, in a manner much like the day before, and the day before that. Hermione had finally collapsed into bed from exhaustion Thursday evening, fully clothed, and managed to sleep for a few hours. She woke up at dawn, and crawled weakly out of bed.

After a wash, she changed her clothes and wandered down to the Common Room. It was early, but the fire had already been lit. Hermione curled up in one of the squashy armchairs in front of it and tried to retain some of the warmth.

She was listening to the sounds of students stirring above her when the portrait hole burst open. Professor McGonagall came through, flustered and visibly upset. She was so preoccupied that she didn't even notice the girl in the chair by the fire.

"Professor?" Hermione said, unintentionally letting the statement become a question.

McGonagall started, and looked at Hermione with wide eyes. "Merlin, child! What are you doing up?"

Hermione opened her mouth to answer, but McGonagall put up a hand, shushing her. "No matter. Come with me."

McGonagall had turned and was out the portrait hole before Hermione had a chance to rise from her chair. She jumped up, and scrambled after the older woman.

Down the stairs and along dark corridors, Hermione followed, confused and scared. Her terror deepened when she realised she was being led to the Hospital Wing.

McGonagall stopped before the wide double doors that lead into the infirmary, and turned to look at Hermione.

"A half hour ago, Blaise Zabini was dumped on the grounds, just inside the school gates. He's been very badly hurt, and Madame Pomfrey has been working madly just to stabilise him. We think she's succeeded, and the Headmaster agreed that you be told, and brought here."

McGonagall paused and looked at Hermione with pity in her eyes. "This is against my better judgement, I might add," she said quietly, and placed a hand lightly on the girl's shoulder.

"He's in a coma, Miss Granger," McGonagall said gently. "He may not wake up for a very long time, or he may never wake up at all. He may well die. And while I thought this would be a terrible way for you to remember him, I was out-argued."

"Did you know…?" Hermione asked, trailing off mid-sentence.

"Not until the Order was notified that the Zabinis had been attacked. The entire family was kidnapped. A few days ago, in Knockturn Alley, Rosemary Zabini was found dead, but Franco, Blaise's father, is still missing. To be completely honest, there's not much hope for him. In any event, after it was discovered what had happened, I was appraised of the friendship between you and Blaise by Headmaster Dumbledore."

"Did…did he tell…" Hermione found it increasingly difficult to speak. Her throat was growing thick, and she looked down at the floor.

"No other members of the Order were told," McGonagall said quietly. Hermione nodded, and was surprised when she was swept into a fierce hug.

"I'm so sorry, child," McGonagall whispered in her ear before releasing her, and smoothing out her tartan robe. "Are you ready?"

Hermione nodded dumbly, and slowly followed McGonagall into the Hospital Wing.

* * *

The hushed, frantic whispering of panicked conversation greeted Hermione and McGonagall as they stepped through the doors.

Hermione could see a small group of people milling about nervously around a bed, down at the end of the long room. McGonagall stiffened, and put a hand out behind her, gesturing for Hermione to stop.

"Wait here," the professor said quietly before she swept towards the others.

Hermione stood stock still, staring at the increasingly moving group. Something was clearly wrong. Slowly, not sure if she even wanted to see, Hermione started walking towards the bed. She caught glimpses of white sheets between figures, but before she could get close, Snape, looking particularly ominous in a black, hooded robe, removed himself from the group and started towards the doors.

He didn't appear surprised to see Hermione, and when he intercepted her he grabbed her arm above the elbow and steered her to the door.

"But, Blaise…" Hermione said, twisting in Snape's grip and trying to look behind her.

"Not now, Miss Granger. Believe me when I tell you that you do not want to see him right now."

Hermione looked up at the professor, knowing her face was openly showing the horror she felt.

Without sparing a glance down, Snape's mouth thinned. "Madame Pomfrey is doing her best, but you would simply be in the way. Return to Gryffindor Tower, and when Mister Zabini is stable, you will be allowed to see him."

They went through the doors of the Hospital Wing, and Snape released his grip on her arm. He looked at Hermione coldly, his arms crossed, and she realised with a start that he was still wearing his Death Eater robes.

"Go to your Common Room. Now."

Dutifully, too tired and dazed to argue, she turned and began trudging back towards Gryffindor Tower. Snape watched her until she was out of sight, then turned and headed back down to the dungeons.

* * *

In hindsight, Hermione would never call it the worst day of her life. It was more of a non-day. She simply went about her normal routine, running completely on autopilot. The day happened, but later, she would have been hard-pressed to remember any particular detail of it, other than the horrifying events of early morning.

She had done as Snape instructed, and went back to her dormitory, where she went up to her room, and sat on her bed. Presently, Lavender's horrible alarm clock went off. Without waiting for her roommates to begin moaning and whining about getting out of bed, Hermione stood, hefted her satchel over one shoulder, and went down to the Common Room.

There were only a handful of students already up, but Hermione ignored them. She climbed through the portrait hole, and made her way down to the Great Hall.

She was a bit early for breakfast, but once she sat down at the Gryffindor table, a house elf popped up beside her.

"Is Miss wanting anything?"

"Yes," Hermione said quietly. "A pot of tea, please. And some toast."

The house elf bobbed her head in acquiescence, and disappeared. A moment later, a cup and saucer, a steaming pot of tea, a heaping plate of hot buttered toast and all the accompanying accruements appeared on the table in front of Hermione.

Mechanically, she poured the tea, and added cream and sugar to her cup. She spread raspberry jam on a piece of toast, took a bite, and chewed slowly.

She could have been eating cardboard covered in mud, and wouldn't have been able to tell the difference.

Hermione ate slowly and carefully, and the plate of toast slowly shrank. By the time she was on the last slice, most of the students and staff had arrived.

She ignored the worried glances she was receiving from Professor McGonagall at the Head Table, where intense, whispered conversations were going on. Hermione drained the last drops of tea from her cup, and got up to leave.

Harry and Ron almost knocked her over as she was leaving the Hall.

"Hermione! Why are you down here so early?" Ron asked distractedly as he ran his hands through his hair, trying to get it to stop sticking up.

"I wanted to do a bit of review with a pot of tea," Hermione said, and some small part of her was surprised at how easily the lie rolled off her lips.

"Oh," Ron said, looking at her askance. Hermione forced herself to smile, and hoped her face didn't crack with the effort.

"I'm really alright, but I forgot a book and need to go get it. I'll see you both in Transfiguration."

She ran off, leaving Harry and Ron to watch her retreating back, and wonder.

* * *

The day passed surprisingly quickly. Hermione's body went about the daily routine with ease, while her mind stalled, not able to move past the events of the morning. Later, she would realise she had been in shock, but there, inside the moment, she couldn't see what was wrong.

She floated through her classes, oblivious to most of what was going on around her. It was clear from the whispered conversations and scared faces that the students had heard about Blaise.

_His family, they were attacked…no, I heard it was after Christmas…yes, he's in the Hospital Wing right now…You-Know-Who sent his Death Eaters, because…_

Hermione tried to tune it all out, and was mostly successful.

Lunch and dinner were both blurs of questions from Harry and Ron, all of which she replied to easily, lying through her teeth every time.

Shortly after dinner, she retreated to her dormitory, changed into her pyjamas, and crawled into bed. She shut the hangings tightly, laced her fingers together over her stomach, and laid in bed, staring at the roof of her canopy.


	12. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer:** None of it's mine, except the plot. And even that could be considered shaky at times ;) In any event, it's all J.K.R.'s and I am making no money from it.

* * *

Hermione woke before dawn, after snatching perhaps an hour or two of sleep. That small amount of rest was enough to allow her to shake off the surrealism of yesterday, and she found herself awake very suddenly – fearful and quite aware. Throwing on yesterday's clothes and not bothering to brush her teeth or hair, she half-walked, half-ran out of the dormitory. As her pace extended into an all-out sprint through the dark and silent corridors, she was grimly amused at the thought of how terrifying and wild she'd appear to anyone who saw her now.

She reached the Hospital Wing quickly – sooner than she'd thought. Stopping outside the double doors, Hermione leaned against the wall, panting. She felt sick and anxious, and while she wanted more than anything to see Blaise, alive and awake, she was terrified he'd still be unconscious. Truthfully, she was terrified of something far worse, but couldn't even bring herself to consider that possibility.

Mentally pulling herself together by reminding herself that she was a Gryffindor, she stepped in front of the doors and pushed them open. With chin and chest stuck out bravely in front of her, Hermione walked past rows of cots to Blaise's and peeked around the privacy sheet, put up as a protection against curious students.

She stared for an instant, then closed her eyes. Stumbling backwards she met resistance, which she barely acknowledged. She turned slowly and looked up at Snape.

"When?" she asked.

"Around 4am. Poppy said he simply stopped breathing. His injuries were just…too much."

Hermione looked down at the floor, trying not to think of body-shaped outlines hidden under crisp white sheets.

"Oh," she said finally.

And she left, without looking back.

* * *

By dinner that evening, the entire school knew what had become of Blaise Zabini. The students sat at their house tables, a wide spectrum of emotions visible on their faces. Most were surprised; unsure of how to react to the death of this boy they didn't really know.

Whispering filled the Great Hall with a soft hissing sound, like pouring sand. The Slytherins, unsurprisingly, were silent. A few of their younger students had been crying when they came in, silently and shamefully. Their housemates had quickly hushed them – now the entire table seemed to be carved from stone, and most eyes were focused on their Head of House, accusing him for allowing this to happen while still looking to him for support.

Snape stared back, meeting each and every needy gaze, giving the support that those children so desperately needed. Hermione watched him from her place between Harry and Ron. They were silent as well – Harry because he was thinking of another time, another boy Voldemort had casually killed, and Ron because he was deeply worried about Hermione.

She wasn't crying though. She couldn't find an anchor to reality that would allow her to accept that this was all really happening. Until she did, she couldn't properly mourn. But she was afraid, deep down. Afraid that if she did accept this reality, then, and only then would it become true. If she didn't believe it, then maybe, for a little longer, everything would be alright. Blaise would still be unconscious in the Hospital Wing, and the sheet wouldn't be pulled up over his face.

So she kept her eyes on Snape, wishing he would look at her as well, and give to her whatever he was giving to his Slytherins. She kept staring at him, even when Ron, following her line of sight, made a choking sound and shrunk down in his seat, watching her watching Snape.

Finally, a weary-looking Dumbledore entered through the main entrance of the Hall. Silence spread across the students in a wave, and all heads turned to watch him make his way to the Head Table. When he reached his chair, he pulled it back and stood, looking down at the assembled students.

"I have no doubt that by this time, you are all aware of what has happened. Blaise Zabini, one of the most gifted of our seventh year students, has died." A low whisper of conversation began again, but quieted when Dumbledore raised a hand.

"I am aware that many of you did not know him, so you must take my word when I tell you that he was clever, astute and a credit to his house. We are the worse without him." The Headmaster paused, and looked directly at the Slytherins. "It was Voldemort and his followers who did this to Blaise and his family. They tortured him so terribly that there was no hope for recovery. Remember your classmate, and remember why he died – because he refused to submit and be exploited, and give up his own free will and ambitions. He refused to be owned."

The Great Hall filled with nervous whispers, and more than a few gasps and cries at the mention of Voldemort. Through the muted confusion, Hermione glanced at the Slytherin table. The older students were sneering for the most part, but some looked uncomfortable and uncertain. And the younger students…

The younger students looked fierce. Angry and vengeful, but not towards Dumbledore. They were lapping up his speech like it was honey, and suddenly, Hermione was furious. Furious at Blaise for dying, furious that he allowed himself to be caught in the first place, and furious that Dumbledore was using his death as propaganda.

The little speech was over now – the interfering old bastard had sat down, and food had appeared in front of her. But she was still furious, too furious to move, let alone eat. So she sat there, staring at some unseen point on the wall, until Harry gave her a gentle nudge with his elbow.

"Aren't you going to eat?"

Hermione stood up stiffly, hefted her satchel over her shoulder, and walked wordlessly out of the Hall. Her legs carried her up the main stairway to the first floor, and along to the Hospital Wing. She didn't even pay attention to the pounding of running feet behind her, until she was caught by the shoulder and spun around. Ron looked down at her, panting to catch his breath.

"Where the hell are you going?" he finally asked.

Hermione stared at him.

"C'mon Hermione, what's going on? Are you sick?"

She shook her head.

"Then why are you going to the Hospital Wing?"

"Ron, please just leave me alone," she said quietly, looking at the floor.

"I bloody well will not!" he yelled, startling her. He took a breath, and continued, more gently. "You've been quiet and tired and so distant all year long, and since we got back it's been worse, even worse than that time before Christmas. And today you've, you've been like the walking dead. I'm _worried_ about you, Hermione!"

She couldn't look at him, couldn't see that kicked-puppy look she knew he would have on his face. If she did, she'd break down. Her throat was already getting thick, and her shoes were going blurry because her eyes were filling up with tears.

"Mister Weasley, I suggest you return to your common room. I need to have a word with Miss Granger."

Hermione's head snapped up at that cold voice. Snape was there, behind Ron, arms crossed and looking particularly malevolent.

Ron opened his mouth to say something stupid, but before he could earn himself a detention, Hermione touched his arm.

"It's alright," she said. "Go."

He gave her a look, perfectly conveying his belief that she had gone completely insane, but after shooting Snape a nasty glare, he headed off down the corridor towards the main staircase.

"Thank you," she said.

Snape nodded, and started towards the Hospital Wing. Hermione trailed behind him. She slipped through the door before it could shut in his wake, and followed him to the bed she had glimpsed early that morning. The crisp white sheet was still pulled up over its occupant, and she had a sudden memory of one Halloween, when she had been very young. Her mother had been ill, and unable to make her a costume, so her father, rather than resorting to a cheap, plastic one from a shop, had cut two eyeholes out of an old while sheet, drawn a silly, smiling mouth below the holes, and she had gone as a ghost. She had loved that costume, simple as it was.

She fought back a giggle, and the urge to charm two eyeholes into the fabric.

Snape stood off the one side, and she slid past him, up to the head of the cot. She reached for a corner of the sheet.

"Miss Granger," he said, his voice low and warning. She ignored him and pulled.

And there he was, his pale, bruised face looking slack and strange. She supposed she should be thankful that his eyes were closed. This wasn't Blaise anymore. It was a husk, a battered, broken shell, and everything about him that had mattered – his laugh, his smile, his mind, his soul – they had all gone somewhere else.

She replaced the sheet, pulling it smooth, and stepped back. That was when the tears started; great wracking sobs that dragged the air in and out of her lungs in choking mouthfuls. And when she started to collapse, she felt herself caught up and settled in a lap. She began to moan, a pitiful wounded sound, and dug her fingers into rough cloth and flesh.

Snape held her for over a half hour, while she sobbed in the ugliest manner possible, and he didn't comment on the large wet spots on his shoulder from tears and mucus. Finally, once she started to calm down, he held a cloth up to her nose.

"Blow."

She did, and was mildly impressed when she saw it was a self-cleaning, self-drying handkerchief. She made a mental note to invest in one. Then, the ridiculousness of the situation hit her. She, an almost-adult, had been curled up in her much-despised professor's lap, sobbing her heart out and admiring a self-cleaning handkerchief, all while she was directly beside the body of her dead…dead friend.

Hermione scrambled to her feet and blushed.

"Thank you," she whispered, looking away. Snape stood up and came closer to her. She flinched slightly when he slid two fingers under her chin and tilted her head up. His eyes bored into hers.

"If you tell anyone about this, I promise you will fail Potions."

She let out a watery chuckle, and sniffed loudly.

"Don't worry. I won't tell anyone. I never even told anyone about…" she trailed off, one hand helplessly gesturing at the body on the bed.

Snape nodded, and looked down at her until she began to fidget under his scrutiny. He released her chin and stood aside.

"You should return to your common room, Miss Granger," he murmured, "I'm sure Mister Weasley is beside himself with worry, and probably convinced that I've cut you up for potions ingredients."

She turned to go, and took a few steps before she paused.

"Thank you, sir. I…" she trailed off, unsure of what, exactly, she wanted to say. Snape just nodded again, a glimmer of sympathy and sorrow in his black eyes. With that small comfort of understanding and being understood, she fled.

* * *

She fled, retreating to what may have been the worst possible place for her to go. The fourth floor hallway, sixth door on the right. She burst through the door, frantic, needing some sign of him.

She stopped dead in her tracks, and stared. Her letter was still resting on the window ledge, where she had left it. She had to clap a hand over her mouth to stifle the grief-stricken moan that threatened to escape from her lips.

Slowly, she walked towards the window, and picked up the roll of parchment. She unrolled it, and started at what she saw – while the writing was still in the same, smooth unidentifiable Dicto-Quill hand, it was not what she had written.

_I miss you too._

Quietly, her face carefully expressionless, Hermione tucked the parchment into her robe, and walked out of the room.

* * *

Hermione mourned, privately. She couldn't tell Harry or Ron, not after everything that had happened. More than that, she couldn't tell them because she didn't think they would ever be able to understand.

She threw herself into her studies. N.E.W.T.s were still coming, regardless of the fact that the entire Wizarding World was holding its collective breath. But the expected attack never came. Occasionally, a family would turn up dead, slaughtered with the Dark Mark floating over their home, but there was never anything more.

Still, school was school, and Hermione needed the structure it provided and the focus it gave her. It helped her to get through those first awful six months after Blaise's death. She barely looked up from her books during that time.

But somehow, despite everything, June _did_ arrive, sunny and warm as ever, and the students of Hogwarts _did_ write their exams and finish their year.

Hermione, Ron and Harry were quickly ushered off to 12 Grimmauld Place, and were quickly inducted into the Order of the Phoenix.

From then on, things started to get much worse. The number attacks began to slowly and steadily increase – families fled to the Continent, trying desperately to escape the approaching war. For two years, the Order of the Phoenix prepared, and trained, and waited. Finally, on his twentieth birthday, Harry insisted that they begin to actively seek out Voldemort.

_We've waited patiently for too long,_ he had said, angry and frustrated after yet another attack. _Voldemort is picking us off, while we wait for him to come for us. I refuse to wait any longer._

So they stopped waiting. And after a long, hard and unhappy year of searching, they found him.

Holed up in cave, magically dug off of an abandoned Tube line in London, Voldemort had hidden under their very noses for years. No one was more surprised and furious than Snape, who felt deeply and privately responsible for failing to ferret out such an important bit of information.

And so, on one cool, beautiful spring day, The Order of the Phoenix, backed up by a battalion of Aurors, attacked from all sides. Voldemort had set up far too many alarms and wards for them to stage a surprise attack, and shortly after they began their campaign, the caves and tunnels were quickly crawling with Death Eaters. But once in, they were unable to escape – Dumbledore, in an astounding display of power, erected anti-Apparition wards around the entire area, effectively trapping everyone inside – Death Eaters, Aurors and Order members alike. The Order meant to finish it once and for all.

The battle was fierce, long and terrifyingly cramped. Curses rebounded off of walls, and spells met and exploded with appalling intensity, often in the combatants' faces.

But finally, they reached the centre of the infestation, where Voldemort waited.

Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, managed to live yet again. Quickly, and without ceremony, he killed Voldemort once and for all, losing his scar in the process.

And that was that. The Aurors and Order members collected the dead, injured and captured, and returned to the surface.

Ron, Hermione and Harry, barely out of their teens, became heroes overnight. They accepted the accolades and praise with embarrassment, and tried their best to escape the limelight. Ron went about his Auror training in Edinburgh, and Hermione was offered a position at the Ministry in research. Harry, realizing he still had far more money than he knew what to do with, declared he had no desire to do anything of consequence (at least for a few years), and traveled to Canada where he rented a flat on Globe Alley in Toronto's Wizarding area, determined to enjoy some measure of anonymity.

The casualties of war were honoured, in a simple, cylindrical memorial erected in the main lobby of the Ministry of Magic. The names of all victims and presumed victims of Voldemort were inscribed around it's outer wall, while inside the half circle, a small fountain gently gurgled out into a smooth pool. It was almost unanimously considered an improvement over the Fountain of Magical Brethren.

Hermione didn't cry at the opening ceremony, but rather a few days later, alone in her dark flat.

She was going to be starting her job at the Ministry in a few weeks, and she was excited, overjoyed and terrified. The prospect of it delighted her: researching and experimenting; working on challenging problems which she could find solutions to; giving her practical, logical mind free reign.

But until then, she wasn't quite sure what to do with herself. Weeks after the battle, there were still celebrations and parties. She found herself a little sick of it all, particularly when her mind traveled, inevitably, back to Blaise. And once her mind began to travel in that direction, puzzling thoughts regarding Snape were never far behind.

So she tried to lose herself in Muggle London, and spent her days wandering the city, exploring places she hadn't been able to safely visit in years, until finally, one day, she made her way to Covent Garden, where she found a small, lovely café. And inside that café, she discovered something that was not entirely unexpected.


	13. Epilogue

**Disclaimer:** Everything recognisable belongs to J.K. Rowling and I am most certainly not making any profit from it.

* * *

_ Epilogue  
  
_

On the patio of a small Wizarding café in London, Hermione suddenly realised she had been staring into space. She refocused her eyes, and noticed Snape watching her, a question floating, unasked, in his eyes.

She bit back the forthright "what?" she was about to blurt out, and looked closer. If she asked him directly, she'd get no answer – Snape wasn't yet ready to put himself forward.

"I was thinking about the differences between Slytherin and Gryffindor," she offered. "But not in the way most people do.

"I remember when we were young, and how sensitive Ron was about…things. Material goods, and wealth. He was jealous of the students who were better off, whose parents bought them extravagant gifts and fancy robes. And he was always so embarrassed by his poor things and hand-me-downs.

"And I see now that Gryffindors are all about the obvious gestures of love, or what could pass as love. Expensive gifts, extravagant gestures, and so on. I know, we're not very subtle. I just wish that I had been able to appreciate more subtle hints when…"

Hermione trailed off, unsure if Snape knew who, exactly, she was talking about. He continued to watch her, seemingly gathering his thoughts.

"Blaise cared very deeply for you," he said, finally.

She looked down at the table and smiled a small, sad smile. "Yes," she said finally, "I know he did. I knew it then, too. I just didn't know how to tell him I felt the same way."

They were both silent, lost in their own pasts.

Hermione smiled, faintly, and ran her finger along one of the more prominent veins on the back of Snape's hand.

"I think I started to fancy you then, you know. After we went to the Hospital Wing, and after…when you let me cry on your shoulder like a soppy little twit."

He watched silently as she slowly ran her fingers over his thumb.

"It was strange; I still knew you were a nasty, vicious, unfair bastard – to your students at least – but I also understood that you were more than just a professor. You stopped being simply an authority figure, and adult, and became…not quite an equal. But a human being. A man."

She shook her head and chuckled. "That was what did me in, I think. Realising you were just a man. A callous, abrasive, cold man, but a man nevertheless."

Severus smiled, faintly, and they were both silent for a while, breathing in the stillness of the garden patio.

"You were the one who found him, weren't you?"

Snape looked up at her, caught off-guard by her sudden question, and for a brief second, Hermione could see guilt in his eyes. She nodded, looking away.

"Yes, I thought so. I'm assuming it was after you returned from being summoned. Did you watch them torture him?"

Snape's silence was heavy, and his hand slipped away from hers. Hermione looked back at him, smiling sadly.

"No," she said, reaching across the table and wrapping both hands around his fingers, "no, I didn't mean it that way. I don't blame you – there's nothing you could have done, except what you did do. I can't imagine how horrible it must have been. To know he was being killed slowly, and that you couldn't do anything without sacrificing a great deal.

"I understand that there was a choice to be made," she said quietly. "He was one boy, weighed against the entire Wizarding World. And while the Gryffindor in me insists that sacrificing everything to save Blaise would have been noble and brave and wonderfully romantic, I am, at heart, a pragmatist. And you couldn't have saved him. I could have before he reached that moment, perhaps, but I didn't."

Snape sighed and looked down. "No," he said awkwardly, "you couldn't have. His family's fate was planned long before you even met him. They had refused to side with Voldemort when he was first coming into power, and the Dark Lord quite enjoyed serving out long-awaited revenge, particularly when it was least expected."

Hermione blinked, and stared at the flame of the small candle on their table.

After a minute, she smiled forlornly. "I'm not sure if knowing that makes it all better, or worse. But thank you for telling me."

Snape nodded, and looked uncomfortable. He seemed to be caught up in an internal struggle of some kind, and Hermione waited quietly for him to come a resolution.

"Are you hungry?" he finally said. Hermione nodded, surprised.

"Then would you like to have dinner?"

"I…yes. Yes, I would."

Snape nodded, stood up suddenly, and after a moment's hesitation, extended a hand. Tentatively, Hermione took it, and stood up as well.

Tucking her arm into the crook of his elbow, Snape led her back into Subsentio, out its door, and into the pleasant bustle of Covent Garden.


End file.
